Greece Adventures Day 3 (1/7/17): Akrotiri & Hello Naxos

Day 3 was a chill one, spent mainly travelling and eating. The best things in life.

♥

We spent the morning exploring Akrotiri, an archaeological site in the south of Santorini. It used to be a Bronze Age settlement, which was destroyed by a volcanic eruption around 1627 BC and was preserved due to the volcanic ash. It was alright, but me being me, and disinterested in just about anything historical, I got a little bored... If you like seeing these sorts of things, it's a great site to check out though!

At noon, we hopped onto our ferry that took us from Santorini to Naxos. It was a large fancy ship that looked too expensive for the price we paid for the tickets, but we weren't complaining! The journey took roughly two hours, so we spent that time trying to figure out what horrible incident happened based on randomly generated words from a ghost hunting app, involving a cliff, coin, guilt, about six different people, and a dog.

We gave up in the end.

And this tragic tale will haunt our lives forever.

(Just kidding!)

And here we are, welcome to Naxos! I have to admit, I loved our time in Naxos more than in Santorini. There were fewer tourists in Naxos as it's a lesser-known island, and we spent more time having fun and eating out. Naxos has some wonderful beaches too, unlike Santorini's rocky cliff faces.

We stayed at the Kallisti Studios, which had the most beautiful rooms. Each one had a different theme, and the furniture and design of each room were so cute and fit together so harmoniously.

Practicality was a little lacking (why is there no stool at the vanity?! I had to squat every time I wanted to check myself in the mirror!), and the A.C wasn't in the most sensible spot. There was a large built-in wardrobe directly below it, meaning that the air didn't circulate as it should've and even with the A.C turned on, we still had an uncomfortably hot room. Nonetheless, the other room we had on the ground floor was fine, so I assume the 2nd-floor room (above) was a one-off.

Our first sit-down, proper meal of the holiday was at the Antamoma Restaurant, a very highly-rated restaurant in Naxos town which had gorgeous views of the sunset.

Yes, more sunset photos. Who doesn't like sunset photos?

I would highly recommend the seafood orzo, it was an absolutely delicious dish served in such a stunning way. There were little dots of sauce around the plate of orzo and prawns balanced neatly in the centre. You know it's going to be a good plate of food when they serve it with dots!

♥

I love you

xxx

Greece Adventures Day 2 (30/6/17): Stairs & Sunsets

I don't think I've ever had this many photos in one post before, so enjoy!

♥
 

Our original plan for the morning of Day 2 was to take a scenic walk all the way from Fira to Oia, a roughly 10km hike that would have taken us a bit more than two hours, probably closer to three including photo-taking and snack breaks.

What we didn't consider was the extreme heat that we'd be walking in, so only a few minutes in we had turned into the five most cranky tourists in the world, each sweating gallons and already tired of the views. Needless to say, after less than 2km we stopped at Imerovigli, the next village along the way, and hopped onto the next bus that would take us to Oia.

Ah, God bless the bus' air conditioning!

Oia is pretty, I'll give it that. I don't think it's worth walking the entire way from Fira to get there, in a heatwave or not, so I'm glad we decided to take the bus. The views were nice, but the views are always nice wherever you are on Santorini.

There's the Church of Panagia in the main square, which is a classic example of a Santorini building. Stark white walls and a blue dome, and even a Greek flag in front, just in case you forget you're on a Greek island. It's definitely more than a normal building though, especially with its beautiful interior decor, and the peacefulness that surrounds it.

Back in Fira, we spent a portion of the evening walking down the Karavolades Stairs, around 600 steps down the steep cliff from the town to the port. There are donkeys at both ends of the staircase for those who don't want to walk it, and while they are tamed, walking past them was quite a terrifying ordeal. And they stink.

And their faeces stink too.

The walk was surprisingly pleasant, despite how it may sound. The steps themselves are really gentle, and once you get past the lines of donkeys and the smell, there are some amazing photo opportunities along the way.

The port was a bit of a disappointment when we arrived, mainly because it was too late, so it wasn't busy enough to have a lot of the hustle and bustle it usually has, yet it was also too early, so no-one was around to see the sunset that would happen later. We took advantage of the quietness of the port to take photos without being tsked for being in the way, or having hordes photobombing every image, which was nice for once!

Being too lazy to walk up the stairs again, we took the cable car back to Fira and started our hunt for the perfect location to watch the sunset.

Then we found the perfect spot, to see the most perfect sunset.

♥

I love you

xxx