We had left money with the front desk to pay for our excursions, since we didn’t have an emplaced Transat representative. Those tickets had arrived and our first excursion was a bus tour to a museum, a small village, a black beach and a wine tasting.

We woke up and went for breakfast, which King Thiras provided. I’m not sure how many rooms the place has, but either it’s very few, or they bank on not everyone coming down to breakfast at the same time, since there were only 5 or so tables, seating 4 each. There was a little buffet of eggs, plain yogurt, peach halves; and the lady proprietor brought coffee, juice, and these thin grilled peices of toast which I quite enjoyed.

We headed down the hill to the main road (determined to be the main road since it actually had traffic on it) and waited for the bus. There was a pretty long delay, and each time a bus approached we’d get hopeful, but it would pass by. But finally a bus arrived for us and found it was mostly full from other pick-ups. The tour guide, her name I can’t remember, seemed nice enough, and used touches of self-depricating humour.

Our first stop was a museum, which I believe was the Museum of Prehistoric Thira. She gave us a bit of a lecture before going in, basically not to touch anything, including the walls, don’t approach anything whenever possible, and breathe only as necessary. Inside was mostly spacious and things were behind glass, but there were some of the larger urns and other pottery behind ropes, with people waiting around who were dressed as if they could have been tourists, but their gaze so intent that you knew they were security.

One of the more interesting items in the museum was a table that was formed by a negative mold of volcanic ash. What is now Santorini was, it is thought, a nearly ring-shaped island, with a volcano in the middle, and as they tend to do, the volcano erupted and the shape of the island changed. The volcanic ash encased a small table. The table itself is gone, but the hollow form was filled with liquid gypsum.

Whatever you do, don’t compare this to Pompeii, the locals hate that

There was a scale model of Akrotiri which only represented a couple of percent of the entire settlement. The rest of it lies under the current villages, who are reluctant to be town down for excavation. The actual site isn’t open to the public after an accident killed a tourist. Since the entire economy of the place is dependent on tourists, they reacted by just closing the whole thing down until they could guarantee safety. As we walked around the museum, the tour guide would remind us here and there to stay away from this, or don’t touch that. A fly landed on a wall near here, she shooed it away with a “Don’t Touch”. Flash photography was forbidden, though she didn’t initially tell us why, until someone, possibly accidentally, took a very blatant flash shot of a wall-segment, and she told us all how vivid the colours were when she was younger, but the flash photography has caused them to fade so much. The guilt was palpable. I ducked out of the museum tour early to use the bathroom, and when I came out, a fairly large line had formed. I’m not sure what it is about bathroom technology in Greece, but it appears that even in a museum, toilet paper and toilet seats are still purely optional features of a bathroom.

We next went up to a mountain to what I believe was the highest point that we could get to, there is a monastery further up by they don’t want us tourist folks bothering them. The view was mostly obscured by wires and generally I found the views looked better closer up. We then went to a small village to take a look around. The place seemed completely deserted, we joked that they were all at work operating as tour guides and bus drivers. We went around taking pictures of things the way only tourists can; whatever might have been mundane for the locals was fascinating to us.

The locals probably consider this an eyesore, but we take pictures

We went to lunch just across from a black beach, the place was called The Best, when it should have been more aptly named, The Expensive. The lunch for the three of us was 50 euros, so around 75 dollars canadian. I think I had a pan pizza, and would have to redeem myself later on. We then went to the beach, which was sort of black I guess. It was made up of volcanic stone, and being dark, was quite hot on the feet. The girls went swimming while I played with a few bits of the rock which were very light and pourous. I just killed time until that portion of the excursion was over since I didn’t bring my swimming stuff.

In summer I imagine it’s advisable to stay on the walkway

Our last stop was at a winery called, amazingly, Santo Wines Winery. Where they make wine. We also got to try some of the wine, one of which was something we sort of compared to an icewine. Now obviously they can’t actually make icewine, but this stuff had a sort of sweetness to it. So Alicia and I each bought a bottle. I later referred to the brand and Vintorini, but was corrected that it was, in fact, Vinsanto. I like my name better. Somewhere along these trips, our tour guide told us a story about how the light on Santorini seemed different. She had bought very expensive coloured glasses from there, and had them shipped to Crete where she spends the off-season time. When they arrived, she didn’t like the colours and thought they sent the wrong ones, but didn’t want to make a fuss, and gifted them to a friend. Later, she found then again and once more ordered them, and the same wrong colours were seen when she opened the package. She phoned them and they assured her that they were the ones she wanted. She realized that the sun of Santorini was needed to make the colours appear the way she remembered. She gifted them again. Unfortunately, not before someone told her she could have just used them in her Santorini place since she spent a lot of time there as well.

We got bussed back to our hotel and watched the sun set again. We were thinking of going to Oia, another town which was famed for it’s sunsets, but we decided to do it the next day. We went to a restaurant called Cesare’s (for some reason). I drank yet more Mythos, another half liter of the stuff. And I think I had another pan pizza, so I’d really have to redeem myself later, I’d have to eat something I’d never normally eat. But what? Dun Dun – Dunnn!

To Be Continued