April 13, 2017
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After a very relaxing day yesterday, and a grey sky today, it was time for a hike. We quickly ate some breakfast, grabbed some picnic items at a nearby bakery, and hopped on the bus. On the eastern side of the island located high above Perissa (to the south) and Kamari (just north), lay Ancient Thira. You can hike up to the top from either town, but we chose to start from Perissa.📷Black sands of Perissa Beach 📷📷Timiou Stavro, The Church of Holy Cross 📷Sensible church location It was a short walk from the beach to the trailhead. After studying the map we decided to also take on Profitis Ilias, the highest point of the island (567 meters), and the oh so sensibly located cliff church, Panagia Katefiani.📷Yellow and Green trail 📷📷Ekklisia Panagia Katefiani 📷📷Because normal sized steps would be too easy Once we made it to the top of the saddle it became a bit more windy and the sun attempted to peek through the clouds. Along the trail we saw some wildflowers, but nothing compared to the abundance we saw once in Ancient Thira. After paying the nominal entrance fee of 4€ each, we continued up the prominence to the city ruins covered in wild daisies, poppies, honeysuckle, fennel, and so much more.I only included a small number of the pictures taken at Ancient Thira. If you ever find yourself in Santorini during the spring, I would definitely recommend visiting Ancient Thira. I would imagine in summer it’s a lot easier to see the ruins without the wildflowers, but it would not be nearly as spectacular.📷Phantom tollbooth 📷📷Picnic on the edge 📷Perissa down below 📷📷The residences of Ancient Thira 📷Garrison full of poppies After enjoying Ancient Thira and our picnic of potato and leek pie, spinach and feta pie, and a salami sandwich (heavy on the mayo, even by my standards), we continued on our hike up towards Profitis Ilias. Along the way the fennel kept getting taller and taller, and the aroma warm fennel and honeysuckle filled the air. At the top of the mountain is a military radar complex and a monastery, of course.📷📷Looking towards Fira 📷Profitis Ilias 📷Moni Profiti Ilia On the way down towards Pyrgos, it started to drizzle a bit, so we scurried down the mountain in order to catch the bus back to Fira. Earlier that morning we made dinner reservations at Metaxi Mas, our host’s favorite restaurant, which is located in Exo Gonia. We wanted to be back in time to shower and change before going to dinner. Granted, at the time, we didn’t know that reservations come with a built in buffer of 3 hours (!), since Greek’s are notoriously late.📷Exo Gonia – Agios Charalambos Back on the bus we rode towards Kamari, but this time but got off in Exo Gonia, which is about a 15 minute drive from Fira. From the bus stop, it took us another 15 minutes or so to walk up to restaurant. After a day of hiking, we were definitely feeling the burn.Dinner was decadent and consisted primarily of cheese (yay). Olive bread, cheese, olives, and Raki, came with the table. Ryan, having drank Raki in Turkey, found immense pleasure in witnessing my first encounter with the vile substance. The most favorably I can describe it is black licorice flavored rubbing alcohol.📷Filo wrapped feta with honey and sesame seeds 📷Oven baked asparagus (I promise there’s asparagus in there) 📷Spicy pork with feta and peppers 📷Spinach linguine 📷Don’t know the name but it sure was tasty/free After dinner we made our way back down to the bus stop. On the way, we somehow befriended another dog. Normally, this would be fine, but since the bus stop was along a busy road, this created a bit of problem. This dog (no name tag on his collar) decided it was a great idea to play in the road at night during peak traffic hours. I nearly had several heart attacks as I watched him come within inches of getting hit multiple times. When we boarded the bus the dog finally left, which was a relief.We made it back into Fira around 9:30 PM, the latest we have stayed up this whole trip so far!
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