Day 20: September 24th. Transitions.

The ferry ride from Athens to Santorini was beautiful. We could see Greek islands in the distance, surrounded by miles of deep blue ocean for pretty much the entire 8 hour journey.

We landed at the port of Athinios in Santorini, and jammed onto a crowded bus to Fira, the capital city of the island. From there, we took another bus to Oia at the northern tip of the island, and checked into a hostel that looks classically Santorini. It's just beautiful here: the tops of the churches really are painted a deep blue, and the cliffs drop dramatically into the ocean. In fact, the Greek isles in general are much more abrupt than I anticipated. There are no rolling beaches, no gradual slopes. There's the ocean, and then bam! There's a mountain! Granted, Santorini is the site of one of the biggest eruptions in the earth's history, but still.

Once we settled into our hostel, we explored Oia by foot. As we walked around, there were throngs of people lined up to see the sunset. We were overwhelmed by the crowd of tourists...overall we get a very different feel from them than we did from our fellow travelers in Turkey. This crowd seems much less likely to get up early to hike, less likely to seek out and talk to local people, and much more likely to spend all night partying, and buy a lot of useless crap. It's an interesting change of pace.

After a delicious pita dinner, we wandered the streets a bit more, trying to get our bearings. Luckily, we stumbled across a little bakery, so that we could try Greek baklava! It's in fact quite different from Turkish baklava: it's a lot thicker and heavier, and tastes of cinnamon and walnuts, instead of just walnuts and honey. The jury is still out on which is better.

Although it's still early, we're about to hit the hay...it's been a while since we slept horizontally!


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