After a late night of packing and prepping for our trip, Heather, Kathryn, Joana, and I woke up early and were off to the Thessaloniki airport for our flight to Berlin. While we were waiting in line, a man came up to me and started asking me questions in German. This was great. No one in Greece assumes that I speak Greek, so it was great to feel like I looked like I belonged. I couldn’t help him at all, but it was awesome that he thought I could. This happened to me a few times in Germany and I loved it. On the plane, when we flew below the clouds over Germany we looked down and saw red, orange, and yellow trees and got really excited. Besides for missing people, fall in New England is what I’m missing most about home right now, so it was great to finally see some fall colors. When we arrived in Berlin we needed to conquer the public transportation in order to get to our hostel. Luckily Kathryn is very travel savvy so she had us hopping on and off the s-bahn until we got to our hostel. We were staying in the outskirts of the city, in Wannsee, for our first night in Berlin. We passed through several neighborhoods on the way to the hostel that were like adorable German villages. Our hostel was right on a lake in Wannsee and that, along with the fall foliage, made really feel like I was home.
After we got sort of settled in our hostel we were back on the s-bahn to the city and on a mission to get train tickets to Prague. After a little confusion at the train station in Berlin we found tickets for the next morning to Prague. We then wandered around Alexanderplatz, a square in Berlin, for awhile and just took in the sights. We saw a guy that looked about our age and asked him where young people went in Berlin. He replied with, “I’m actually from Holland, so I don’t really know, but I’m meeting my friends over there…you’re welcome to join us.” So soon we were sitting at a café with Saskia, Boi, Michel, and a few other people. We ended up chatting for hours about American politics and viewpoints, and it was awesome to hear other European opinions on everything that is going on in America. They were in Berlin with their graduate program looking at internships and learning more about possibilities within their field – which happened to be cognitive neuroscience or something very intimidating like that. After the café closed, we went back to their hostel with them that was down the street and talked some more. We exchanged emails and phone numbers, and when we finally left to go back to our hostel, Joana started crying because she was sad to leave our new friends.
After oh, about 2 hours of sleep we were on a train to Prague. It was about a 4 hour journey through some of the most beautiful villages and mountain and farmland. The train went along a river for most of the time and it even went through Dresden, which was also great to see. Once in Prague we hopped onto their tram system, but ended up going on the wrong direction. While it delayed us for about an hour, we ended up being able to see some beautiful views of the city. I’ve never seen more gorgeous architecture than what I saw in Prague. Each and every building was unique and breathtaking. We got to our hostel, which was more like a hotel, got settled and headed out. Our first mission was to find Czech food. We found a restaurant up the street and we all ordered the first thing on their specialties menu. It was goulash and it was so good. Food in Greece is not what you’d call hearty, so it was great to have a meal that almost instantly filled you up.
Kathryn is a HUGE fan of hockey, and she found out there was a game in Prague that night. We went to a few tourist information places, but they didn’t have any helpful information. We decided to go to the arena to see if there was any way we could get tickets. In the metro we saw a group of men that Joana thought looked like they were going to a hockey game. I don’t know why she thought this – they weren’t wearing jerseys or scarves or anything, but she decided to ask anyway. Turns out that they were in fact going to the game and one of them spoke English so we were able to get directions from him. When we got to the arena, we found a scalper selling tickets. They cost 100 kruna (I think thats the currency – Czech is really difficult) which is the equivalent of about 5 USD. We got tickets and ended up being about 3 rows away from the ice. The arena wasn’t packed so after the first period we went over to the Praha Slavia’s cheering section. These people are serious about their hockey. Prague ended up losing but it was interesting to see the fan-team dynamic. At the end of the game the entire team sat on the ice looking at their fans. The fans cheered something, and then the team got up and applauded their fans.
After the game we wandered around the city some more and found ourselves in an Irish pub. There was a group of people at the table next to us, and the guy asked if we would take their picture. Then we all started talking. Ger, Kate, and Anna were from Ireland and were in Prague to celebrate Kate’s birthday. We talked to them all night and Heather and Joana planned their trip to Ireland with their help. They were only planning on going to Dublin, but our new friends offered to show them around Cork if they made it that way.
The following day we explored the city of Prague. But before we left I went downstairs in the hostel to borrow a towel. While I’m walking into the lobby, I hear my name. No one knows me here, so I was a little surprised. I turn around and see this girl and it takes me forever to place her. Turns out it was Casey, a girl I graduated from high school with. In the same hostel, in Prague. What a small world! She’s studying in Budapest this semester and was in Prague for the weekend.
We started at the castle and did a tour of the grounds there. From the castle you can see almost the entire city – I’ve never seen so many spires in my life. Then we went to the Old Town, Stare Mesto where the astronomical clock is. It’s a 24 hour clock that also has sun and moon positions, and a calendar with months. At each hour the clock chimes and the figured around the clock move. After having lunch in Stare Mesto, Heather and I decided to just get lost in Prague. (Not really lost…they have trams on almost every street. As long as we could see the tracks we wouldn’t really be lost) While I enjoy seeing the touristy parts of cities, it is almost more valuable to just wander around and see where you find yourself. So we just started walking and seeing what there was to see. We ended up in Vinohrady, which is the oldest part of the city. From there we walked along the river from the Fred and Ginger Dancing House to the National Theater and a building we named the Bubble Wrap building. On this walk we walked past someone I sort of recognized but I couldn’t think of where I might know him from, so I didn’t really think anything of it. One of the girls he was with stops dead in her tracks and says, “No way!” Turns out it was the people Heather, Danica and I met in Santorini that let us stay with them in Athens! We chatted for a bit and shared any useful information we had about Prague. Heather and I then went to Charles Bridge, which is a pedestrian only bridge with towers and a beautiful view of the city. We were climbing up one of the towers and spotted this guy Bobby from ACT who was there with his parents to celebrate his birthday. Its crazy how small this world is – to run into 3 separate groups of people in one random city on the same day. That along with the fact that Joana met so many people with connections to Oregon (where she’s from) really just goes to show how connected the world really is.
From the bridge we continued just wandering around the city. We had planned on meeting back up with Joana and Kathryn for a fun night out in Prague at a place one of Joana’s friends had suggested. Heather and I were pretty tired from our long days of traveling and walking so we just decided to go back to the Irish pub we’d been at the night before and head home pretty early to get a good night’s sleep. We stayed for maybe an hour and were just about ready to head home when this guy comes out of the bathroom and asks if he could sit with us. We said sure and asked him a few questions. He had clearly been enjoying the pub for quite some time, so two minutes later he was asleep at our table!!! His friends came over and apologized and tried to wake him up – with no luck. We chatted with them for a little bit – there was a group of them from all over the world. Jamie from Ireland, Tom from Australia, Sleeping guy from England, and another guy from Scotland – who knows how they knew each other! They were hilarious and really fun to talk to, but we still decided to go home early because our bus back to Berlin left pretty early in the morning.
We slept almost the entire bus ride from Prague to Berlin, but luckily it didn’t end up being any longer than the train ride – which we thought it would be. We got back to Berlin and found our hostel pretty easily – it ended up being in the square that we explored the first night in Berlin. We heard that there was a hard rock café in Berlin, so that was our very first stop – we were all craving some American food after 6 weeks of eating Greek. Then we all just wandered around some more and found ourselves at the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag. We happened to be there during Berlin’s Festival of Lights, when all the important monuments and buildings are lit up with colorful lights and project images into the sky, which was really cool to see. We wandered around the city some more and went back to the hostel to get ready for a night out. On our way out we walked past another Irish pub that had seemed kinda lame our first night in Berlin, but for some reason we decided to go in for just a bit. Before we had even ordered drinks, a group of about 15 englishmen surrounded our table and started talking to us. They were in Berlin on a “stag weekend” to celebrate their buddy’s upcoming wedding. They were all dressed as nerds as part of their theme and they were wicked funny. We had our own American Idol competition (Heather’s impression of Britney Spears is spot on – so she won) and the guys made Kathryn impersonate Sarah Palin all night. Before we knew it, it was 4 am and we never made it farther than just down the street when we had planned on a more adventurous night out, but it was wicked fun anyway.
The next morning we got an early(ish) start and headed to Checkpoint Charlie and the Jewish Museum. The museum was really interesting and had a lot of really cool exhibits. From there we headed to the longest remaining stretch of the Berlin wall and walked that. We had thought about going to a concentration camp not too far from Berlin, but having had so little sleep and it being mostly dark out, we decided it would probably be too intense for us. Heather and I then decided to get lost in Berlin because we’d had so much success with that in Prague. We wandered and wandered until our feet really couldn’t hold us up any longer (I seriously ended up breaking down and buying a pair of slippers to walk back in). We found a German pub and brewery and got brautwurst, sauerkraut, and german potatoes. Because we had to be at the airport at 4 am the next morning, we decided that we were just going to stay up all night, but when we got to the hostel Heather and I really just needed to nap before even thinking about heading out. When we woke up we just decided to pack up and stay at our hostel and play cards in the lobby instead of trying to find a place to go.
We made it back to Thessaloniki yesterday a group of travel-tired girls. We had a lot of fun and packed a whole lot into the long weekend. Germany made a huge impression on me, and I’m really drawn to all the history that’s there. I know that I will be going back in the near future to see what else the country has to offer.
When I get my pictures online, I’ll post the link on here. Please let me know if the links didn’t work last time.
I have one day of classes tomorrow and then on Saturday I’m off on a school trip to Meteora, which is home to the rock tower monasteries.
Here’s a list of the rest of my travels while I’m abroad – I may try to fit in a trip to Vienna or Sophia, Bulgaria as well, as long as I can do it very inexpensively:
November:
1-2 Meteora
7-9 Athens
15-16 Thessaloniki
21-23 Istanbul, Turkey
29-30 Thessaloniki
December:
6-7 Thessaloniki
9ish – Kayla from Stonehill comes to visit!
13-19 Venice, Florence, and Rome with Kayla and Julie from Hollis
21- Home
Wednesday, 29 October 2008
Wednesday, 22 October 2008
It’s been a while since I’ve updated this sucker, and my dad keeps asking for an update, so I guess its time. I’ve had a pretty standard couple weeks in Thessaloniki, which is nice because the first few weeks were chock-full of exploring and traveling and just getting settled. It’s really finally starting to feel like home here, which is also a great feeling.
Classes are going really well, I’m finding them to be very interesting. My professor in my soc. of gender class is fantastic. She’s become almost a surrogate mother to us – the class is about 6 study abroad students (all girls) and four greek students. We are able to ask our professor Aigli just about anything – like how to find bleach in the grocery store or whether to accept a job offer at a bar – and she is always willing to pause the class to talk about life for a few minutes. The greek students always laugh at our seemingly inconsequential problems, but it means the world to us to be able to ask someone all these questions that we come up with.
My greek class is going fantastically – well, that might be an exaggeration. But I am finally able to read things. It’s so exciting to walk down the street and be able to read the things that I say – it doesn’t matter that I still don’t know what things mean, being able to read it is awesome. Sometimes I’ll hear bits and pieces of other people’s conversations and when I hear something I recognize I get really excited that I’m able to understand them. I can also now order a few different food items at a restaurant – like chicken, which is kortopoulo. I still don’t know how to order a gyro without tomatoes or onions, so, per usual, I just pick it out. But in greek class we’re learning a lot of great information and conversational things. Taking Spanish classes have really helped me learn Greek – they’re not at all alike – but learning them can be done in the same way. This is what I know how to say in Greek (I also know its variations – questions, referring to other people, that type of thing) – its not a lot, but it can get me pretty far in conversations:
English:
Hello. My name is Heather. I am from America. I live in New Hampshire. Now I am living in Thessaloniki. I am a student. I speak English. I speak a little greek. I don’t understand.
Greek:
γεία σας. με λένε Heather. Είμαι από την Αμερική. στη νέα Hampshire. Τώρα στην Θεσσαλονίκη. Είμαι φοιτητρα. μιλώ αγγλικά. Μιλώ ελληνική λίγο. Δεν καταλαBενώ.
Pronunciation:
Ya sas. Me lene Heather. Ime apo tin Ameriki. Sti Nea Hampshire. Tora stin Thessaloniki. Ime fititria. Milauw anglika. Milauw elenika ligo. Then kataloveno.
Ethics is going well. I’m still finding it very interesting. We had our midterm this week, which was an essay response to a film we watched about religion being the “root of all evil” and whether religion is the basis for morality. Class discussions continue to be very interesting and I look forward to going to that class a lot.
Econ. Oh Econ. I knew I was going to dislike this class a lot. And I do. The material is confusing and my professor just makes it worse. She is really terrifying. I know that’s a horrible thing to say, but we’re all in agreement. She’s just so impatient and makes you think you’re right when you’re actually wrong and then is very condescending when she finally tells you. I’m seriously scared of this woman – we’re gonna start a support group. Luckily she cancelled class on Thursday – I didn’t want to tell her I was going to miss it, in fear of getting scowled at the way she does. So, Econ’s going to be the rough class as I predicted, hopefully I’ll survive unscathed.
And now its time for another installment of “a day in the life…” Get psyched.
Grocery Shopping – Always an adventure. And when I say adventure I mean it. Grocery shopping entails walking into a grocery store and wandering around aimlessly trying to find anything that might look sort of familiar. It usually ends with several laughing fits and serious confusion. Grocery stores here are smaller and have much less variety than in the states – yet you can find the craziest things inside a grocery store – like socks, and underwear, and rugs, and plates, but never any ziplock bags or peanut butter. That’s a lie, peanut butter can be found, but only if you go on the right day. There’s only ever one tiny jar of skippy creamy peanut butter on the shelves – for 5 euro. That’s like 7 bucks – something that would cost less than a dollar in the states (I don’t know this – I’ve never bought peanut butter in the states, this is a guess). Luckily my mom is great and sent me some – Thanks Mom! Nutella, however is everywhere. I’ve never seen so much of the stuff – people must eat it at every meal. Like my roommate, Kathryn. The only food that she’s bought is nutella and bread. She has 3 jars, which I’ve named Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. Wow. Olive oil comes in 10 gallon jugs and salad dressing just doesn’t exist. I walked around the grocery store searching for tuna fish and was so excited when I thought I’d found it. I studied the can and concluded that what I thought might be tuna was actually condensed milk - maybe. I’m not sure how its possible to confuse the two, but I did. Then I really found tuna, and it was fantastic – until I opened the can in my apartment and found that what I had gotten was NOT tuna. It was some sort of fishy substance, so at least I got that part right, but into the trash it went.
Laundry – Also an adventure. There are no dryers in this country – unless you wanna pay 8 euro to get it done at a Laundromat about a mile away, which I don’t. We have one very small washing machine, which tends to discolor all white clothing (hence the need to ask Aigli about bleach). I do my laundry about once a week. I put a load in the machine in the basement of my building and I do another load IN. MY. SINK. Yes Mom, I’ve hand washed my laundry. The first time I did it on a bright sunny day and was really excited because the clothes would dry pretty quickly on my balcony. 10 minutes later the clouds came, and 3 days later my clothes were finally dry. Note to self – do laundry a few days before running out of clothes to wear – learned the lesson the hard way.
Tavernas – Now I know I’ve talked about tavernas before, but they deserve their own category because they’re great. Basically you go to a taverna after 10 pm and prepare for a few hours of wining and dining. We’ve recently adopted a certain taverna as our own. It used to be called the secret taverna, but surely enough everyone has since made a trip there. We used to call it the chicken place (Best. Chicken. Ever) but now its Apostoli’s. That’s not the name of the place because all the tavernas kinda mush together so you never really know the name of the place you’re at. Apostoli is the owner of this taverna, and he’s fantastic. He gives us free wine and free dessert and introduces us to all his friends. One night we met some greek men, Nikos (of course that’s his name) and Vasilis who then took us to a Bouzoukia/ Rembetiko, which is a traditional greek club complete with greek dancing. Like holding hands and dancing in circles type of greek dancing. It was so awesome, even though we had no idea how to do the dances. We never would have been able to get into the place on our own, let alone find it, so it was great to go with people who know the inside scoop. Somehow taverna outings always end in an adventure. You can go to a taverna with the intent of staying just an hour or two and then going home, but somehow, someway, it never ends like that.
Now its time for the really big news! In about 12 hours I will be in Berlin! This weekend is our fall break, meaning we have Monday and Tuesday off from school, but we’re leaving a little early. We’ll be in Berlin for one night, take a train to Prague for 2 nights, and then go back to Berlin for another 2 nights. I’m so excited for this trip! I’m going with Kathryn, Heather, and Joana. Whenever the 4 of us get together – which is a lot, we’re next door neighbors – it’s always a good time, so we know this long weekend will be great! I’ll update as soon as I get back!!!
Classes are going really well, I’m finding them to be very interesting. My professor in my soc. of gender class is fantastic. She’s become almost a surrogate mother to us – the class is about 6 study abroad students (all girls) and four greek students. We are able to ask our professor Aigli just about anything – like how to find bleach in the grocery store or whether to accept a job offer at a bar – and she is always willing to pause the class to talk about life for a few minutes. The greek students always laugh at our seemingly inconsequential problems, but it means the world to us to be able to ask someone all these questions that we come up with.
My greek class is going fantastically – well, that might be an exaggeration. But I am finally able to read things. It’s so exciting to walk down the street and be able to read the things that I say – it doesn’t matter that I still don’t know what things mean, being able to read it is awesome. Sometimes I’ll hear bits and pieces of other people’s conversations and when I hear something I recognize I get really excited that I’m able to understand them. I can also now order a few different food items at a restaurant – like chicken, which is kortopoulo. I still don’t know how to order a gyro without tomatoes or onions, so, per usual, I just pick it out. But in greek class we’re learning a lot of great information and conversational things. Taking Spanish classes have really helped me learn Greek – they’re not at all alike – but learning them can be done in the same way. This is what I know how to say in Greek (I also know its variations – questions, referring to other people, that type of thing) – its not a lot, but it can get me pretty far in conversations:
English:
Hello. My name is Heather. I am from America. I live in New Hampshire. Now I am living in Thessaloniki. I am a student. I speak English. I speak a little greek. I don’t understand.
Greek:
γεία σας. με λένε Heather. Είμαι από την Αμερική. στη νέα Hampshire. Τώρα στην Θεσσαλονίκη. Είμαι φοιτητρα. μιλώ αγγλικά. Μιλώ ελληνική λίγο. Δεν καταλαBενώ.
Pronunciation:
Ya sas. Me lene Heather. Ime apo tin Ameriki. Sti Nea Hampshire. Tora stin Thessaloniki. Ime fititria. Milauw anglika. Milauw elenika ligo. Then kataloveno.
Ethics is going well. I’m still finding it very interesting. We had our midterm this week, which was an essay response to a film we watched about religion being the “root of all evil” and whether religion is the basis for morality. Class discussions continue to be very interesting and I look forward to going to that class a lot.
Econ. Oh Econ. I knew I was going to dislike this class a lot. And I do. The material is confusing and my professor just makes it worse. She is really terrifying. I know that’s a horrible thing to say, but we’re all in agreement. She’s just so impatient and makes you think you’re right when you’re actually wrong and then is very condescending when she finally tells you. I’m seriously scared of this woman – we’re gonna start a support group. Luckily she cancelled class on Thursday – I didn’t want to tell her I was going to miss it, in fear of getting scowled at the way she does. So, Econ’s going to be the rough class as I predicted, hopefully I’ll survive unscathed.
And now its time for another installment of “a day in the life…” Get psyched.
Grocery Shopping – Always an adventure. And when I say adventure I mean it. Grocery shopping entails walking into a grocery store and wandering around aimlessly trying to find anything that might look sort of familiar. It usually ends with several laughing fits and serious confusion. Grocery stores here are smaller and have much less variety than in the states – yet you can find the craziest things inside a grocery store – like socks, and underwear, and rugs, and plates, but never any ziplock bags or peanut butter. That’s a lie, peanut butter can be found, but only if you go on the right day. There’s only ever one tiny jar of skippy creamy peanut butter on the shelves – for 5 euro. That’s like 7 bucks – something that would cost less than a dollar in the states (I don’t know this – I’ve never bought peanut butter in the states, this is a guess). Luckily my mom is great and sent me some – Thanks Mom! Nutella, however is everywhere. I’ve never seen so much of the stuff – people must eat it at every meal. Like my roommate, Kathryn. The only food that she’s bought is nutella and bread. She has 3 jars, which I’ve named Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. Wow. Olive oil comes in 10 gallon jugs and salad dressing just doesn’t exist. I walked around the grocery store searching for tuna fish and was so excited when I thought I’d found it. I studied the can and concluded that what I thought might be tuna was actually condensed milk - maybe. I’m not sure how its possible to confuse the two, but I did. Then I really found tuna, and it was fantastic – until I opened the can in my apartment and found that what I had gotten was NOT tuna. It was some sort of fishy substance, so at least I got that part right, but into the trash it went.
Laundry – Also an adventure. There are no dryers in this country – unless you wanna pay 8 euro to get it done at a Laundromat about a mile away, which I don’t. We have one very small washing machine, which tends to discolor all white clothing (hence the need to ask Aigli about bleach). I do my laundry about once a week. I put a load in the machine in the basement of my building and I do another load IN. MY. SINK. Yes Mom, I’ve hand washed my laundry. The first time I did it on a bright sunny day and was really excited because the clothes would dry pretty quickly on my balcony. 10 minutes later the clouds came, and 3 days later my clothes were finally dry. Note to self – do laundry a few days before running out of clothes to wear – learned the lesson the hard way.
Tavernas – Now I know I’ve talked about tavernas before, but they deserve their own category because they’re great. Basically you go to a taverna after 10 pm and prepare for a few hours of wining and dining. We’ve recently adopted a certain taverna as our own. It used to be called the secret taverna, but surely enough everyone has since made a trip there. We used to call it the chicken place (Best. Chicken. Ever) but now its Apostoli’s. That’s not the name of the place because all the tavernas kinda mush together so you never really know the name of the place you’re at. Apostoli is the owner of this taverna, and he’s fantastic. He gives us free wine and free dessert and introduces us to all his friends. One night we met some greek men, Nikos (of course that’s his name) and Vasilis who then took us to a Bouzoukia/ Rembetiko, which is a traditional greek club complete with greek dancing. Like holding hands and dancing in circles type of greek dancing. It was so awesome, even though we had no idea how to do the dances. We never would have been able to get into the place on our own, let alone find it, so it was great to go with people who know the inside scoop. Somehow taverna outings always end in an adventure. You can go to a taverna with the intent of staying just an hour or two and then going home, but somehow, someway, it never ends like that.
Now its time for the really big news! In about 12 hours I will be in Berlin! This weekend is our fall break, meaning we have Monday and Tuesday off from school, but we’re leaving a little early. We’ll be in Berlin for one night, take a train to Prague for 2 nights, and then go back to Berlin for another 2 nights. I’m so excited for this trip! I’m going with Kathryn, Heather, and Joana. Whenever the 4 of us get together – which is a lot, we’re next door neighbors – it’s always a good time, so we know this long weekend will be great! I’ll update as soon as I get back!!!
Monday, 6 October 2008
21 and Santorini
I guess I'll start with a little birthday description, but the main content of this post will be my weekend trip to SANTORINI.
So, birthday. I turned the big 2-1 on Wednesday, so we decided to celebrate Tuesday night. A big group of us got back from campus around 8:30 and headed out to an Ouzeri (basically a tabepna. taverna. personally, i like it in greek better) for dinner. We had the most amazing chicken souvlaki ever. You haven't had chicken until you've had this chicken. Anyway, the restaurant gave me a bottle of ouzo for my birthday, which was really nice of them. I don't really like ouzo, it tastes like black licorice, but it was a nice gesture and a great souvenier of my 21st in greece. Around 11:30 we all headed down to the waterfront and got to Dante's just in time to celebrate at midnight. As always, the guys who work there facilitated the party.
Wednesday morning, I woke up early to treat myself to the best birthday present I could think of. I went with my friend Danika to book a trip to Santorini for the weekend. Wednesday night all of the girls in my apartment building gathered in my room for a mini surprise party complete with a cake, a birthday card (in greek, naturally), and even a makeshift birthday candle (we haven't really mastered the grocery stores here yet). I was kinda sad I couldn't spend the day with friends and family from home, so for them to do that for me made the day really special.
So Thursday night, after a full day of classes I quickly packed and Heather, Danika, and I made our way to the train station to catch the 6 hour train ride to Athens. It was quite the experience. You know the train that takes Harry and his friends to Hogwarts...thats the kind of train we took to Athens - with our own(ish) little room and everything. It was pretty great. We got to Athens around 6:30 am and booked it to Piraeus Port. I was a little nervous we wouldn't be able to find our way around the metro, but it was really easy. We boarded the ferry and made ourselves as comfortable as we could for the 8 hour trip. You may think I'm crazy for travelling 14 hours one way for just a weekend in Santorini, but I can promise you it was 100% worth it. I would have travelled twice as far to stay half as long and it still would have been the best decision of my life. The ferry ride was actually pretty pleasant. We watched the sun rise over Athens and we also stopped at Paros and Naxos islands on the way. I thought both of these islands were beautiful, but as soon as I saw Santorini, I knew that that was the island to go to.
As we all herded off the ferry, we saw a whole line of men trying to get people to stay at their hotels. Perfect. We went over and started to bargain. Being college students abroad, our funds were obviously limited. We knew what price we wanted and went for it. Luckily, our bargaining skills paid off and we were able to get a room for 20 euro each for 2 nights. AWESOME. We made it to the hotel within an hour and were off exploring very soon after that. We stayed in Fira, so that was the first town we explored. There were all these little shops leading up to the top of the cliff the town is built on. We meandered our way up and as soon as we saw the view from the top we were speechless. Having seen pictures of Santorini, I knew it would be beautiful, but pictures do the island no justice. I honestly think it was the most gorgeous view I have ever seen in my life.
Once we got a little bit over our ooohs and ahhhs (they never really went away...everything we saw stunned us) we walked past a cafe built right on the edge of the cliff. It was just about time for the sunset, and the man who owned the place started chatting us up. He spoke great english and was just about the nicest most enthusiastic man ever. And of course his name was Nikos, who's isn't? We took a seat at his cafe for some frappes (a foamy iced coffee) and to watch the sunset. We explored a little more and went to a Taverna for dinner. After dinner we decided to grab some gelatto before going to bed early. We stopped at a little gelatto place, where we met Nikos #2, who is the only Nikos we know thats our age. We sat and chatted with him for a while, and he wanted us to wait for him to get off work so we could all go out together. We had a big day planned for Saturday, so we didn't take him up on his offer, but we planned to meet up the following night.
On Saturday morning, we woke up for a few minutes to watch the sunrise from our balcony at the hotel. An hour or so later we trekked down to the old port to catch a boat trip over to Nea Kameni Volcano. We hiked up the volcano with Sophocles, our tour guide, who knew a lot about Santorini and its volcanic activity. On the volcano, we met a group of kids in the College Year Athens program. This isn't important now, but it will be later. I've never been on a volcano before, so that was super cool. After the volcano hike the boat took us the the hot springs where we jumped off and swam in the warm water. Then the boat took us to Thirassia Island for lunch and a little more swimming and sightseeing. Danika, Heather, and I grabbed a quick lunch and walked around the pebbly beaches looking for sea glass and shells. On the way from Thirassia to Oia (pronounced Ia), the glass-bottom boat sailed over a reef with a small shipwreck, which was also really great to see.
Here comes the fun part. When we first saw the donkeys, we knew we had to ride them. So, we rode donkey from the port in Oia to the town above. What an experience. We were all laughing hysterically and half-terrified the entire way up, but it was so awesome to turn the corner on a donkey and see the view of Oia. Oia is a really beautiful part of Santorini. Its on the very edge of the northern corner of the island, so the views are spectacular, and the sunsets breathtaking. We walked around the town for a while, and found it to be considerably more quiet and couple-friendly than Fira. It being the off season for Santorini, the entire island was much quieter than it would have been in the summer time, but the weather was still very warm and sunny and most places were still open for business. After exploring Oia for a while, we walked to the very corner of the island and found a place to watch the sunset. The sign outside the place said that it was the most popular place for marriage proposals, and I believe it. As the sun was setting a sailboat sailed right into the sun's light and it was gorgeous. We grabbed dinner at a taverna and caught the public bus (aka a coach bus....wayyyy nicer than public busses anywhere else in the world) back to Fira for a night out.
Back in Fira, we walked around a bit and wandered into a couple of bars. We saw Sophocles (our tour guide from the volcano) sitting outside the bar (young) Nikos suggested and sat and chatted with him for a while. He imparted several hilarious words of wisdom to us, and even gave us a little grammar lesson in greek. Unfortunatly, Nikos wasn't able to close his shop, so he wasn't able to come out with us Saturday night either. But, he did offer to drive us to the beach sunday morning, so we exchanged phone numbers and he said he'd try to wake up in time.
Sunday we woke up early to get a little shopping in before calling Nikos to wake him up. When calls to Nikos proved unsuccessful, we decided to get innovative. We really wanted to get a little more sun before getting the ferry back to Athens, and our hotel didn't have a pool. So we decided to find one. Sophocles, the night before, reminded us that you never know until you try, and the worse that will happen is that you'll get no for an answer. So, we decided to go to the nearest hotels and give it a shot. The first place was a hands-down absolutely not. The second place, however, looked like there was no one there and that it was closing for the season. We walked in and offered to pay to use their beautiful pool. The lady immediatly said, "if you don't mind the weather, the pool is yours." While it was pretty windy, the sun was still hot, so of course we didn't mind the weather. While we were there, Nikos called back and wanted to meet us in his village or at the port for coffee before we left. We didn't end up having enough time, but I wanted to share the story of Nikos' great hospitality anyway.
Once we got on the ferry, which was a titanic-like endeavor, we saw the guys studying in athens again. Since we landed in Athens at 1 am and didn't leave until 7 am, we decided to ask them if they knew of anywhere we could go to kill some time. Without hesitation, they said that we were more than welcome to get a taxi back with them and crash for a few hours at there place. So thats what we did. It was a little weird, as expected, but we would have been lost without them. They gave us directions from their place to the metro, and we offered our apartments in Thessaloniki to them if they ever wanted it. I've been so impressed with everyone's kindness here in Greece. Granted, there are definitely people who aren't so friendly, but the vast majority of people will do anything to help you out.
It was a long journey to and from Santorini, but it was so worth it. I can honestly say that was one of the best, if not the best, weekends of my life. Before Thursday when people asked, "If you could go anywhere in the world where would you go?" I would always answer with Santorini. And honestly, if they asked me now, I would probably still say Santorini.
Here are the links to the photo albums on Facebook...check them out!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003813&l=56bd2&id=1326450028
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003814&l=6d859&id=1326450028
Also, if you're interested, here's the link to the photo album of my trip to Mt. Athos and Halkidiki:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003751&l=0d0e3&id=1326450028
So, birthday. I turned the big 2-1 on Wednesday, so we decided to celebrate Tuesday night. A big group of us got back from campus around 8:30 and headed out to an Ouzeri (basically a tabepna. taverna. personally, i like it in greek better) for dinner. We had the most amazing chicken souvlaki ever. You haven't had chicken until you've had this chicken. Anyway, the restaurant gave me a bottle of ouzo for my birthday, which was really nice of them. I don't really like ouzo, it tastes like black licorice, but it was a nice gesture and a great souvenier of my 21st in greece. Around 11:30 we all headed down to the waterfront and got to Dante's just in time to celebrate at midnight. As always, the guys who work there facilitated the party.
Wednesday morning, I woke up early to treat myself to the best birthday present I could think of. I went with my friend Danika to book a trip to Santorini for the weekend. Wednesday night all of the girls in my apartment building gathered in my room for a mini surprise party complete with a cake, a birthday card (in greek, naturally), and even a makeshift birthday candle (we haven't really mastered the grocery stores here yet). I was kinda sad I couldn't spend the day with friends and family from home, so for them to do that for me made the day really special.
So Thursday night, after a full day of classes I quickly packed and Heather, Danika, and I made our way to the train station to catch the 6 hour train ride to Athens. It was quite the experience. You know the train that takes Harry and his friends to Hogwarts...thats the kind of train we took to Athens - with our own(ish) little room and everything. It was pretty great. We got to Athens around 6:30 am and booked it to Piraeus Port. I was a little nervous we wouldn't be able to find our way around the metro, but it was really easy. We boarded the ferry and made ourselves as comfortable as we could for the 8 hour trip. You may think I'm crazy for travelling 14 hours one way for just a weekend in Santorini, but I can promise you it was 100% worth it. I would have travelled twice as far to stay half as long and it still would have been the best decision of my life. The ferry ride was actually pretty pleasant. We watched the sun rise over Athens and we also stopped at Paros and Naxos islands on the way. I thought both of these islands were beautiful, but as soon as I saw Santorini, I knew that that was the island to go to.As we all herded off the ferry, we saw a whole line of men trying to get people to stay at their hotels. Perfect. We went over and started to bargain. Being college students abroad, our funds were obviously limited. We knew what price we wanted and went for it. Luckily, our bargaining skills paid off and we were able to get a room for 20 euro each for 2 nights. AWESOME. We made it to the hotel within an hour and were off exploring very soon after that. We stayed in Fira, so that was the first town we explored. There were all these little shops leading up to the top of the cliff the town is built on. We meandered our way up and as soon as we saw the view from the top we were speechless. Having seen pictures of Santorini, I knew it would be beautiful, but pictures do the island no justice. I honestly think it was the most gorgeous view I have ever seen in my life.
Once we got a little bit over our ooohs and ahhhs (they never really went away...everything we saw stunned us) we walked past a cafe built right on the edge of the cliff. It was just about time for the sunset, and the man who owned the place started chatting us up. He spoke great english and was just about the nicest most enthusiastic man ever. And of course his name was Nikos, who's isn't? We took a seat at his cafe for some frappes (a foamy iced coffee) and to watch the sunset. We explored a little more and went to a Taverna for dinner. After dinner we decided to grab some gelatto before going to bed early. We stopped at a little gelatto place, where we met Nikos #2, who is the only Nikos we know thats our age. We sat and chatted with him for a while, and he wanted us to wait for him to get off work so we could all go out together. We had a big day planned for Saturday, so we didn't take him up on his offer, but we planned to meet up the following night.
On Saturday morning, we woke up for a few minutes to watch the sunrise from our balcony at the hotel. An hour or so later we trekked down to the old port to catch a boat trip over to Nea Kameni Volcano. We hiked up the volcano with Sophocles, our tour guide, who knew a lot about Santorini and its volcanic activity. On the volcano, we met a group of kids in the College Year Athens program. This isn't important now, but it will be later. I've never been on a volcano before, so that was super cool. After the volcano hike the boat took us the the hot springs where we jumped off and swam in the warm water. Then the boat took us to Thirassia Island for lunch and a little more swimming and sightseeing. Danika, Heather, and I grabbed a quick lunch and walked around the pebbly beaches looking for sea glass and shells. On the way from Thirassia to Oia (pronounced Ia), the glass-bottom boat sailed over a reef with a small shipwreck, which was also really great to see.
Here comes the fun part. When we first saw the donkeys, we knew we had to ride them. So, we rode donkey from the port in Oia to the town above. What an experience. We were all laughing hysterically and half-terrified the entire way up, but it was so awesome to turn the corner on a donkey and see the view of Oia. Oia is a really beautiful part of Santorini. Its on the very edge of the northern corner of the island, so the views are spectacular, and the sunsets breathtaking. We walked around the town for a while, and found it to be considerably more quiet and couple-friendly than Fira. It being the off season for Santorini, the entire island was much quieter than it would have been in the summer time, but the weather was still very warm and sunny and most places were still open for business. After exploring Oia for a while, we walked to the very corner of the island and found a place to watch the sunset. The sign outside the place said that it was the most popular place for marriage proposals, and I believe it. As the sun was setting a sailboat sailed right into the sun's light and it was gorgeous. We grabbed dinner at a taverna and caught the public bus (aka a coach bus....wayyyy nicer than public busses anywhere else in the world) back to Fira for a night out.
Back in Fira, we walked around a bit and wandered into a couple of bars. We saw Sophocles (our tour guide from the volcano) sitting outside the bar (young) Nikos suggested and sat and chatted with him for a while. He imparted several hilarious words of wisdom to us, and even gave us a little grammar lesson in greek. Unfortunatly, Nikos wasn't able to close his shop, so he wasn't able to come out with us Saturday night either. But, he did offer to drive us to the beach sunday morning, so we exchanged phone numbers and he said he'd try to wake up in time.
Sunday we woke up early to get a little shopping in before calling Nikos to wake him up. When calls to Nikos proved unsuccessful, we decided to get innovative. We really wanted to get a little more sun before getting the ferry back to Athens, and our hotel didn't have a pool. So we decided to find one. Sophocles, the night before, reminded us that you never know until you try, and the worse that will happen is that you'll get no for an answer. So, we decided to go to the nearest hotels and give it a shot. The first place was a hands-down absolutely not. The second place, however, looked like there was no one there and that it was closing for the season. We walked in and offered to pay to use their beautiful pool. The lady immediatly said, "if you don't mind the weather, the pool is yours." While it was pretty windy, the sun was still hot, so of course we didn't mind the weather. While we were there, Nikos called back and wanted to meet us in his village or at the port for coffee before we left. We didn't end up having enough time, but I wanted to share the story of Nikos' great hospitality anyway.
Once we got on the ferry, which was a titanic-like endeavor, we saw the guys studying in athens again. Since we landed in Athens at 1 am and didn't leave until 7 am, we decided to ask them if they knew of anywhere we could go to kill some time. Without hesitation, they said that we were more than welcome to get a taxi back with them and crash for a few hours at there place. So thats what we did. It was a little weird, as expected, but we would have been lost without them. They gave us directions from their place to the metro, and we offered our apartments in Thessaloniki to them if they ever wanted it. I've been so impressed with everyone's kindness here in Greece. Granted, there are definitely people who aren't so friendly, but the vast majority of people will do anything to help you out.
It was a long journey to and from Santorini, but it was so worth it. I can honestly say that was one of the best, if not the best, weekends of my life. Before Thursday when people asked, "If you could go anywhere in the world where would you go?" I would always answer with Santorini. And honestly, if they asked me now, I would probably still say Santorini.
Here are the links to the photo albums on Facebook...check them out!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003813&l=56bd2&id=1326450028
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003814&l=6d859&id=1326450028
Also, if you're interested, here's the link to the photo album of my trip to Mt. Athos and Halkidiki:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003751&l=0d0e3&id=1326450028
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