Santorini, Liam-style
1. It's just rained here for the 3rd day in a row. This is extremely unusual weather, from what everyone has told me. There have been spates of partly cloudy weather during the day, but the massive thunderstorms at night have more than made up for them. Unfortunately, all of the thunderstorms have been making it somewhat difficult for me to sleep. I do have to say, though, that they've been extremely scenic to watch--especially when the lightning strikes illuminate the volcano. :-)
2. It's good to be a planner. I bought a spare camera battery the day before I left. Yesterday, my battery died. :-)
3. I have surprisingly eaten far less baklava so far than I had anticipated, but the baklava I've had has been ZOMGamazing. I love walnut baklava, but pistachio baklava is made of even more win and awesomeness!
4. Yesterday, I spent much of the day wandering and window shopping, plus stopping at a bakery (home of the pistachio baklava) and a bigger grocery store to pick up some breakfast foods for the next few days. I came home for a siesta and when I woke up it was stormy, so I stayed in my room, listened to the rain and had breakfast for dinner. Having a kitchen in my room is very handy!
5. The cashier at the grocery store was H.O.T. :-) I loves me some good scenery!
6. Fage yogurt comes in all sorts of NOM flavors here that we don't get in the states. My favorite so far is "biscuit flavored".
7. It appears that while I was out watching the sunset tonight, one of Christa's kittehs came in through the window I'd left open. I see the evidence in little paw prints on my blanket and pillow. Cute. :-)
8. So far, I haven't been able to stay up late enough to have dinner at the proper Greek hour (10 PM). I'm such a morning person, it's pathetic. Fortunately, the restaurants here are used to serving dinner all evening long.
9. There are no street names anywhere on Santorini. It's a very interesting phenomenon, since that's one of the tools I use for navigation. Fortunately, I also navigate well with landmarks. :-) And since this is very much a "turn left and baja" kind of vacation, navigation via landmarks is totally cool.
10. I'm fascinated by the number of churches there are in this small village (the whole village of Oia is less than a mile long). I think I've counted something in the neighborhood of 20 of them. Many of the smaller ones appear to have been turned into homes, and there are a few abandoned ones. I know that the entire population of the island dipped dramatically after the last big earthquake in 1956, so I'm sure that's why so many of them have fallen into disuse. In any case, their blue domes and bell towers are all still there, providing lovely camera fodder.
11. The weather was so miserable for much of today (my sneakers got completely soaked through!) that I spent the greater portion of the day shopping, some for myself and some for others. I have even purchased the obligatory breakables (a small handblown bottle into which I hope to put my black sand and a fabulous pottery bowl with painted Greek fishes) as well as a little locally handmade jewelry. With the way I am about shopping (it's rare that I enjoy it), I wonder whether I'll wind up doing any more while I'm here. We shall see.
12. I have petted many Greek kittehs and taken pictures of many others. Took a lovely one of Basement Cat today with a blue-domed church in the background. I've had my door open this evening while I've been blogging in order to let some of the cool night air in, and two of Christa's cats have come over and posed in front of the open door for me to snap pictures of them. All of the Greek kittehs I've met so far seem to go out of their way to be photogenic. I am amused!
13. Toilet paper cannot be put into toilets here in Santorini.
14. Local vinsanto wine is NOM NOM NOM NOM I must get me some. I have to go back and look at my winery list to see which local wineries make it. It's a sweet dessert wine that has very much the same mouth feel as port, but with a much different flavor. Fortunately, one of my coworkers in RI has agreed to let me ship her any alcohol I might like to purchase, since MA has some extremely stupid rules about shipping alcohol to yourself that you've purchased overseas (as in, you can't do it).
15. I keep thinking that it's Wednesday or Thursday, not Monday. I have to remember that I don't have to rush around--I've still got PLENTY of time to do all of the things I'd like to do.
16. The Greeks set their clocks back for daylight savings time on Saturday night. I didn't find this out until sometime Sunday night. I'm now wondering when we set our clocks back. Is it this upcoming Sunday? Between time zone changes and daylight savings time, my sense of what time it actually is is totally screwed up.
17. If the weather is good tomorrow, I will be going to the volcano. Tomorrow's the last day the volcano tours will be running from Oia. Unfortunately, Christa says she isn't sure if the weather's going to be good enough--if it's not, the town police will cancel the tour. If it's cancelled, I'll have to go to Fira to take it on another day (if they stay running in Fira longer than they do in Oia, that is, otherwise, I'm SOL). In that case, I'm not sure what I'll do for tomorrow, but it will probably involve taking the bus to Fira for the day.
Obligatory pictures!
Windmills on the western side of Oia
the small port of Ammoudi at the base of the western tip of Oia
a small abandoned church just above the port of Ammoudi
One of the bigger churches (still in use) on the western side of Oia