Santorini, Greece - October 22, 2012

The short word here is “wow”. I was up and out by about 8:00 to watch the sail in to this port and from a distance it looked like we were sailing into a collapsed volcano crater with white snow caps in spots. Upon entering this “crater” the snow caps were not snow but the cities or villages of Santorini, built way up there as part of the jagged tops of these mountains and in many cases built into this volcanic rock as caves then a cement facade on top, just incredible. Our write up this morning was as follows: Certainly the most ruggedly beautiful of the Aegean islands, Santorini boasts pitch-black beaches, white washed cliffs and sensational sunsets. Also known as Thira, this island owes its dramatic landscape to one of the largest volcanic eruptions in recorded history. In approximately 1600 B.C. the volcano that made up this island erupted in a catastrophic explosion known as the Minoan eruption. What was once the island of Thira sank to the bottom of the caldera and the sea rushed into the abyss to create the great bay. The bay, once the high center of the island, is 1,300 feet deep in some places, so deep that when boats dock in the small port of Athinios, they do not drop anchor. The lagoon-like caldera that was created in this eruption measures 32 square miles and is 300 to 400 meters deep. Along the caldera are cliffs rising 1,100 feet, with the clusters of the towns of Fira and Oia perched on the top. I believe we used the sky hook today as we sat in this bay (sky hook is when you have the ability to set your ship’s GPS to latitude and longitude coordinates and the engines will keep the craft at this location) and where tendered into the small port. There are three options to get to the top of the 600 stair cliff, walk, gondola or take the donkey trail. We opted for the traditional way to the top using the donkeys, very fun - I did wear my shorts so I seem to have case of donkey burn on the inside of my knee. We met a couple of wonderful women from Toronto along the donkey trial and shared a cab for the 20 klm ride to the village of Oia - it was suggested that we get to this village because this is where all those beautiful blue domed churched are, yeah the ones you see in all the pictures. So here we have a sample of the beautiful sights we experienced today here in Santorini. Tomorrow we finally have a sea day, we have a Mariner reception early in the morning so I don’t think this sea day will be as relaxing as we were hoping for, oh well we will try to make the best of it...