We arrived in Santorini, Greece before dawn on Wednesday morning. The port is small so the ship had to remain in the harbor and use tenders. It was a nice trip to shore early in the morning.

Our first stop was the town of Oia. Oia is a scenic village on the northwest edge of the Santorini Island within the Cyclades. It is built on the steep slope of the caldera and the houses and restaurants are built into niches carved into the caldera on the seaward side. There are narrow passageways and a central square. As you can see from the photos below, the city abounds with bright white structures sporting brilliant blue domes.

From Oia we headed to the Santo Wines winery. One of the interesting things we learned on the way is that Santorini has a robust wine economy. They don’t plant their grape vines using wires and trellises; they keep the vines low to the ground because of the strong winds. I grabbed a photo of some grapes on the dusty soil.

The wines we tasted were interesting but the snacks were really good and fresh.

After a brief stop at one of the many private chapels, we headed to Dimitri restaurant for a wonderful Grecian lunch. I caught a quick nap (why not?) Then on to Fira and the cable car.

The waiting time for the cable car down to the bottom of the caldera was well over an hour. So we decided to take the snaking trail down. There are many donkeys stationed at both ends to transport people and cargo on the trail but we opted to just hoof it. That was a mistake. You can see from the long shot taken from the water how the elevation changes and the multiple switchbacks. All on uneven gravel paths. It’s only 1km in length but has over 600 stair steps and a 210 meter elevation difference.

After that, it was a quick ride back to the ship and then on to the thermal pool (as if we had not had enough heat all day).