In the very wee hours of the morning we left Athens to catch the 5:45 flight to Santorini with just a moment of terror when I realised that I had forgotten my very important medication in the fridge of the Airbnb. (no worries, had the taxi turn round and go back).When we arrived in Santorini, we took the local bus to Fira and then changed to go to Perissa, which is the town on the southern outer rim of Santorini.
Santorini, btw, was a massive volcano back in the day (there's still activity in the middle - more about that later). Back during Moses' time ('round 1646 BC) the volcano erupted, they reckon it was one of the biggest eruptions the earth has ever seen. They found ash evidence of it in Greenland! Some speculate that the effects of the eruption, coupled with Moses' threats are what persuaded Rames to free the slaves, and cause the red sea to have issues. Today, the main island is literally a sliver of it's former self.
Our hotel for that day/night was booked and we were quite early so we had to drop our bags and amuse ourselves for a couple of hours. Beach any one?
The beach in Perissa is made up of coarse black volcanic sand, and the water is clear and cool, but not cold. There are lounge chairs and umbrellas all along, and we decided that today would be a ''dolche far niente'' day.
Once we settled in to the hotel (very basic, but cheap!) we headed back to the beach and picked a couple of lounge chairs. About 15 min later a guy came by from a restaurant on the strip. 10 Euros please. Apparently these chairs weren't free. Ok we moved (the next ones weren't free either). We hadn't brought any money to the beach, and there's no way you can lie on black sand in the hot sun without slowing cooking. It was lunch anyway and it turns out if you order from any of the restaurants on ''the strip'' you can use their lounges for ''free''.
And thus, we spent our first day in Santorini doing absolutely niente.
P.S. Yes the water was divine!
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