Rhymes With Martini…

The flight to Santorini is quick, but by the time I get out of the airport and into Fira, the sun is setting. The western edge of the island is a sheer cliff with hotels clinging to the wall, vying for sunset viewing real estate. Dozens of doors along the pedestrian path at the top lead to narrow walkways edging down the cliff. My hotel is on the top tier, providing a great view, but no hope for a pool. The risk is too great that a sprung leak would flood the hotels at lower ground. The room is lavish and the size of the soaking tub makes me fear for the safety of those below me, should I cause an overflow.

I spend the night walking the pedestrian streets of Fira. They’re littered with souvenir shops, cafes, and art galleries. I join the flow of traffic up and down these streets. There are a few clubs and bars, but they don’t liven up until 2am or so. By that time I’m exhausted and can only stand around and wallflower at the girls dancing on tables.

I’m still on my habitat schedule, so despite my relatively late night, I get up early and can’t find my way back to sleep. I only have a day or two in each of these towns, so it’s for the best that I get out and see what’s to be seen. I rent a quad bike to help me get around the island. I thought I’d go to the beach, but on my way there I see signs for Ancient Thira and follow some other quad bikes the rest of the way. It’s at the very southern tip of the island, atop a giant hill. It takes about 20 minutes to switchback my way up, passing foot and horse traffic all the way. It feels like I’m going way fast, but when I get to the top, I realize that the wind in my face was natural and not made by my ascent. It’s windy. Very very windy. My sunglasses are blown off my face. I feel like my shirt’s being blown off my body. I lean into the wind and feel it bear my weight.

The ancient city was founded almost three thousand years ago, but the ruins are a bit younger than that. Walking from marker to marker, I read about what once stood where now there are just some stone foundations and remnants of pillars. It’s equally disillusioning when the sites are complete recreations, but seeing nothing but low rubble leaves me a bit cold. The markers show floor plans, highlighting the parts of the foundation that still remain. I think a few perspective drawings, or a scale model of the city as it stood would go a long way.

Walking around, I meet Claudia from Milano. She’s just returned from a sea voyage with friends. One of them is a skipper and under his command, six of them rented a sail boat and cruised around the islands. It sounds like hard work, with a lot of unpredictability, but I must try it someday. It’s an hour wait for her bus so I offer to drive her down on my quad. She returns my generosity inviting me to the pool at her hotel (on the beach side of the island) where I can meet the rest of her crew. I’m not clear on all the relationships, but I think most of the guys work with her boyfriend Andrea for a consumer electronics company.

We drink and play in the pool for a while. Claudia helps me tons with my diving. Jeff kicks my butt at Crazy Eights. We walk to the beach for some lunch. It’s great being welcomed into their group, and i think they appreciate having someone to share their stories of their recent voyage. As soon as we pay, we decide to jump in the ocean. The group of us lead a somewhat mad charge down the shore. I want to rush into the water at full speed and swim out past the waves, but I’m immediately slowed by the coarse sand.

I’d heard nothing but praise for the beaches of Santorini (and the other greek isles) but this one is a bit rough. The sand is mostly rock, and just beyond the shoreline, there’s a field of stones extending far out into the tide. They’re slippery with algae and too close to the surface to offer room to maneuver out to deeper water. After stumbling into wave after wave for a minute or two, I just lay on my belly and float as best I can out past the crashing waves. Once I get some depth under me, it’s cold and clear and feels like air conditioning in the hot sun.

I split from the group, giving them a break from my eager friendship, and all of us time to get ready for dinner. Before heading back to the hotel, I take the quad up the beach and stumble around an old church looking for a geocache. I find it nestled in an old stone wall and filled with lots of neat trinkets. The logbook has a blurb about the region, and mentions a natural spring inside a cave next to a church near Ancient Thira. I can’t pass this up, so I get back on the quad and retrace my tracks back to the mountain. Santorini is not a big island, but I’m covering a lot of ground this day. I spend about an hour looking for this damned church and find a number of cool features. There’s a large cave set in the base of the mountain overlooking the water. It’s a prime spot for leaping out into the ocean, but there are signs everywhere forbidding it. I don’t see anyone else doing it and visions of my broken body sprawled on the rocks below keep me from leaping. I hike all over the place looking for this church and get a variety of conflicting directions from the locals I ask. I ascend back up to the base of the ancient city and hike over to a small cave that looks promising, but find only discarded furniture and supplies from the city restoration.

It’s not until I give up and head back to my hotel that I find what I think is the church. It’s all locked up, but there’s a wooden door set right into the face of a small rocky hillside. My imagination runs a bit wild wondering what sort of cave lays on the other side of that thin slab of wood. The cave pools always seem so primal and pristine. I feel like bathing in one would bring on an Altered States devolution moment or something. Next time. Next time.

Dinner is one of the best meals of the trip, and not just because I ordered everything on the menu.I haven’t been alone that much since I left Macedonia, but this is the first time since leaving Habitat that I’ve been with a big group. The wine flows as freely as the revelry and we eat for hours. I feel incredibly lucky to have met and been invited to join with such a fun and hospitable group.

We wander the streets for a bit, eating gelato and having another drink or two. It’s not a late night, but I walk back to my hotel exhausted. A few steps from my door, I hear the crack of fireworks and turn around just in time to see a large burst over the hotel next door. There’s no followup, but the afterimage of the fire in the sky stays with me as I crawl in bed.