Where in the World are V and M?: The Must See Greek Island

All aboard

One other thing we had to be sure to do while in Athens was get our ferry tickets so we could go to Santorini. That's probably the best known of the Greek islands... (it's the one you see in magazines - white houses with blue roofs that sit on the side of a cliff). We definitely wanted to go there. So we went to the ferry operators office and found out that the ferry workers were going on strike! "Oh no! But Santorini? When else would we be able to come all the way to Greece to see Santorini?!" They said that we could leave Athens on the ferry to Santorini, but for us to come back we'd have to either come back the very next day, or wait till later in the week for the ferry workers to resume work. That was bad news for us since we'd already booked a hotel for 3 nights and we purchased a tour back on the mainland for the day after we were to leave the island. But we decided "Okay, we'll take the ferry there and then find a flight (though it's like 10 times the cost of the ferry) to come back to Athens." We REALLY wanted to see Santorini.

We got to the port the next day and bought our tickets. The ferry had WiFi so while cruising for 9 hours we checked the flights for our return trip. "We're sorry, all flights for your selected travel date are booked, please make another selection." NOOOOOOOO!!! (Only two flights leave Santorini each day and it seems that everyone else heard about the ferry strike and booked a flight.) How are we going to get back? Just cancel our tour and stay in Santorini until the strike is over? Take a flight a day too early? So we began to pray...

First island the ferry stopped at to drop off some passangers - Paros.

Next Island - Naxos. After this was Ios but we missed taking pictures.

and then...Santorini

We arrived in Santorini, on the Aegean Sea, and waited for the ride provided by our hotel. Maria, owner of the Villa Rose Hotel in Fira, took our bags, put them in her Volkswagen and took us to the hotel. She gave us a tour on the ride there and told us all the great places we should see. We talked a lot about the economy of Greece and the island of Santorini. Despite how hard things have been in Greece and on the island Maria was soo sweet. When we checked into our hotel we were soooo surprised, amazed, and happy. The room was so nice... and only 30 euros a night. (We were in Greece during their winter season so every hotel has reduced rates.) The place was clean, the bed was so comfy, the fridge was stocked with all sorts of goodies and they offered us a complimentary bottle of wine. They even offered to wash our laundry... wow! Yep, staying at Villa Rose was wonderful.

Our Awesome Hotel Room

The next day we continued praying for a miracle so we could leave the island and God provided! Sweet! We called the airline and they said, "Yes, we have seats (expensive seats) for you." Either way, thank you God. From then on we were able to get on with our travels without stressing about our return to the mainland. We rented a car for the day (25 euro) and drove from one end of Santorini to the other... Please enjoy the pictures, though our point and click camera could not do it justice :)