Profitis Ilias Monastery
My wife and I aren't fans of big group guided tours but we decided to take one on Santorini - it was actually pretty good. Not too crowded, great guide, and we got to visit places we otherwise would not have made it to. The trip was not without its moments though. We started off by going to the Profitis Ilias Monastery. We had never heard of it. It is at the highest point of the island and getting there was an adventure. Roads on Santorini are not made for tour buses but they are everywhere. It's scary going around blind curves on a road big enough for a car and having buses or trucks coming the other way. Closing our eyes seems to work. However, to get to the monastery parking, the driver had to make a three point turn. To do so, he had the nose of the bus hanging over a sheer cliff. Note - there are no guardrails on Santorini. I thought I was going to poop my pants as we were in the very front seat and knew we were going to die. I think I was shaking for hours after that - wow. And the driver does this every day! The monastery was ok - most of it is closed, but the views of Santorini are awesome. From there we went to the ancient ruins of Akrotiri. This is a village that was completely covered by volcanic ash hundreds of years ago. We like history and ruins but this site is in the beginning stages of being excavated. Greece being Greece, it will proceed at a very slow pace. After this we headed to Pyrgos, a lovely mountain village that we didn't spend near enough time in. If we go back to Santorini we will go there on our own. We spent 1-2 hours in Fira; since we had been there twice already, Heather and I had some very cold beer, people watched, and then savored some great Gelato. One of the highlights of the trip was to be the sunset from Oia. It was actually nice even if half of China was there. Getting out of Oia was interesting to watch - about 80 buses were parked in an lot meant for 10 buses. We look at it as total chaos but the Greeks have it down to a science and everyone eventually found their way to their bus and made it home. We think. All in all this was a very good day but I had to burn my underwear after this bus ride.
I took these photos at the end of September 2019,
Profitis Ilias Monastery
My wife and I aren't fans of big group guided tours but we decided to take one on Santorini - it was actually pretty good. Not too crowded, great guide, and we got to visit places we otherwise would not have made it to. The trip was not without its moments though. We started off by going to the Profitis Ilias Monastery. We had never heard of it. It is at the highest point of the island and getting there was an adventure. Roads on Santorini are not made for tour buses but they are everywhere. It's scary going around blind curves on a road big enough for a car and having buses or trucks coming the other way. Closing our eyes seems to work. However, to get to the monastery parking, the driver had to make a three point turn. To do so, he had the nose of the bus hanging over a sheer cliff. Note - there are no guardrails on Santorini. I thought I was going to poop my pants as we were in the very front seat and knew we were going to die. I think I was shaking for hours after that - wow. And the driver does this every day! The monastery was ok - most of it is closed, but the views of Santorini are awesome. From there we went to the ancient ruins of Akrotiri. This is a village that was completely covered by volcanic ash hundreds of years ago. We like history and ruins but this site is in the beginning stages of being excavated. Greece being Greece, it will proceed at a very slow pace. After this we headed to Pyrgos, a lovely mountain village that we didn't spend near enough time in. If we go back to Santorini we will go there on our own. We spent 1-2 hours in Fira; since we had been there twice already, Heather and I had some very cold beer, people watched, and then savored some great Gelato. One of the highlights of the trip was to be the sunset from Oia. It was actually nice even if half of China was there. Getting out of Oia was interesting to watch - about 80 buses were parked in an lot meant for 10 buses. We look at it as total chaos but the Greeks have it down to a science and everyone eventually found their way to their bus and made it home. We think. All in all this was a very good day but I had to burn my underwear after this bus ride.
I took these photos at the end of September 2019,