Day 15: Santorini, Greece
Today was a long day visiting Santorini, Greece. This is another port that cruise ships cannot dock so all of the cruise ships must anchor and use tenders to get passengers to shore. Seven cruise ships came to port today causing major congestion and delays. Our ship alone has a capacity of ~4,000 people so this is a huge number of people trying to get to shore.
This is our port. We took a tender ashore and, I think, we were supposed to take a boat from here to another port with easier access to the island. For some reason (they said weather) our boat was not there. Since there was no boat, our options were to wait two hours in line to go up a tramway (you can see the towers on the left side of the photo) or walk or ride mules up the switchback pathway. We waited for the tramway with our tour group. It was very hot and humid.
Notice the white buildings on the cliffs. When we first spotted the island from a long way away (on the overcast day) one of the kids asked why there was snow on the top of the islands. It really did look like snow.
Our ship is the foreground ship to the right.
Oia - The most famous village on Santorini
Three Blue Domed Churches. This is a famous photographic spot that was too crowded for us to access. This is Fletcher's photograph from a few weeks prior when he visited on his school trip.
Church of Panagia Platsani
Metropolitan Greek Orthodox Church of Ypapanti Thira in Fira
When it was time to return to our ship, we found that the line at the top of the tram was also two hours long. Everyone was hot and tired and ready to get back to the ship, so we decided to walk down the switchback path with the mules. The mules were going up and down and went wherever they wanted so you had to scramble to get out of the way and watch where you stepped.
It was disgusting and we were very glad to get to the bottom.
It was also a hot and humid day so everyone was a little tired.
In the video above, Tess says while on the tender boat "I'm going straight to the bar." There is a bar in our area of the ship and the kids enjoyed ordering Strawberry Daiquiris (kid version) there. Kenny was their favorite bartender and he knew them by name and would do magic tricks for them.
