Day 31...FETA CHEESE!!!!!

Day 31, July 15th:

Greece Day 2!

Side note:  It is totally weird writing a post about a day in which you didn’t really end because you just slept on a ferry.  It is like the two days just merged into one super long day.  Here it goes anyways…

The overnight ferry ended up arriving in Santorini around 09:30 in the morning.  Babis was waiting for us at the port and took us immediately back to the hotel.  Babis is the awesome guy whose entire family works at Hotel Babis.  This guy was so friendly and made our trip extra enjoyable.  As soon as we got to the hotel, he gave a fresh glass of orange juice, while he carried our bags to the room.  The room that we got for only 43 euro a night had an awesome balcony with a view of the entire village of Karterados.  We got a free shuttle ride wherever we wanted to go, he booked our tour for the next day and we get free breakfast.  The hotel was awesome! 

After we dropped off our stuff, Babis took us to Fira, the main town in Santorini about a 10 minute walk from the hotel, and suggested a great place for breakfast:  Mama’s house!  Now, this place beats the Track Kitchen in every way possible.  “Mama” is the cook, greater, server and comedian for the restaurant.  It was a great way to begin our adventures in Santorini!  When we entered the outdoor restaurant, Mama hollered out at us: “You better say hello to Mama!”  She came out and greeted us and introduced herself.  I ordered blueberry pancakes and Danielle ordered chocolate pancakes.  Both were so full of the respective toppings that you could hardly find the pancake batter.  It was delicious.  She even gave us complimentary hash browns.   Nine other SASers were sitting at the table next to us and she told the other waiter to go get the three beautiful ladies pancakes.  “Why the hell did you not give complimentary pancakes to the three beautiful ladies?  They are beautiful aren’t they?  Well, then give them some damn pancakes!”  She was such a hoot!  Everyone in the restaurant had to get their picture with mama before they left and she always hollered out:  “Make them ugly and me pretty!”  This lady was so funny!  After we finished eating our delicious breakfast, Danielle and I took our pictures with her as well.  She hollers out her famous line and then says “Feta Cheese!” as we smile away!  We really enjoyed our first find on the island.

After breakfast, we head out exploring the village of Fira.  We stopped at several shops along the way.  It was really unique seeing the shops because they are all very diverse in what they sell.   Many souvenir shops only focus on the tourists; however, these stores also focus on the residents as well.  They all sold office supplies, technology equipment, newspapers, magazines, books, stamps, tee shirts, souvenirs, etc. 

After exploring the village of Fira for about an hour, Danielle and I decided that we already were falling in love with Santorini and wanted to spend an extra day on the island if possible.  We immediately head back to the hotel, grab our ferry tickets and go back into Fira to get them changed.  It was kinda like love at first sight!  Everyone on the island was so nice and very helpful.  The view of the surrounding rolling hills, islands, unique white and blue architecture just made us want to EXPLORE!!!!! 

We finally met back up with the other ten SASers and rode the public bus to the small village of Perissa. Before I tell you all about Perissa, I want to tell you a little bit about the island of Santorini in general.  The island is composed of several quaint little villages filled with hotels, villas, restaurants, etc.  Just to put things in perspective, the village of Fira is the main cliff-perched town on the island.  It is located in the middle of the island overlooking the harbor on both sides.  Another unique feature about the island is that none of the roads have street signs or address for that matter.  You travel from place to place based on which village you are going to and all of the signs just have arrows telling you which way to go for each village.  Everyone that is from the island knows exactly where everything is and who runs it.  For example, when we rented our ATV (learn more in Day 33’s blog post), they want to know where you are staying and they will just come pick it up from the hotel.  Everyone knows everybody!  The island also doesn’t have potable water.  It was really pretty cool to see how much the prices of beverages changed from the Greek mainland to the island of Santorini, as well as being able to compare it to the US and the other countries on the voyage.  Since water cannot just come from the tap for drinking, it was extremely low in price at the supermarket and at restaurants on the entire island.  Cokes, Gatorades and other beverages were also much cheaper than expected, but were always found to be about triple the price of a similar size of bottled water (.5L of water was .50 cents, 1.5L of water was 1 euro, .333mL of assorted soft drinks were 1.5 to 2 Euro).  It was really fascinating to see this price differential!  Since it was even a higher commodity on the island, I expected to see much higher price.  Okay, back to the day’s activities and the village of Perissa. 

Perissa is a small fishing village that is famous because of the kilometers of black beaches.   Once we arrived, we walked along the village’s main street, which bordered the beach, in search of some local Greek cuisine.  We ended up eating at Aquarius Restaurant, which was right on the beach.  It was very scenic and relaxing!  I had chicken souvlaki (aka grilled chicken and vegetables on a skewer sprinkled with squeezed lime juice…yum) with rice and french fries.  It was very good!  Another favorite of the Greek cuisine! 

After lunch, we stepped onto the black beach and relaxed!  An hour and a half later, I returned to the bus stop with banana ice cream in hand for the ride back to Fira.  Danielle and I walked down the hill back to the hotel and freshened up for our more elegant evening on the town.  We promptly met back up with the other 10 SASers and took a bus to Santo Wines for a wine tasting over the harbor to watch the sun set.  I tasted the Greek Coca-Cola, as well as the awesome cheese, olive and tomato paste assortment plate.  It was so delicious!  All of the others loved the wines and the sunset was very beautiful!  SAS has taught us to enjoy and appreciate sunsets!!! 

After the sunset, we waited over an hour on the side of the rode for the metro bus.  It actually was so much fun!  We sang songs and chatted with two other Australians that did the wine tasting as well.  Once the bus finally arrived and took us back to Fira, we went to grab a pita for dinner, since it was now around 22:30.  I had an awesome cheeseburger pita for only 2.20 Euro!  We all were ready for bed after our delicious pitas and our long day.