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This is our 5:30 p.m. cocktail group: From left is Nina, Shirley, Shel, Gerri, me, Connie, Linda, Ken, Chuck and Blake. |
| We arrived at the island of Santorini at around 7 this morning, and we had our coffee from room service so we could watch us come in while we got dressed. The island is most of the circle of a volcano crater. |  |
 | Hawk is standing at the top of the newest volcanic island in the middle of the bay of Santorini, it last erupted in 1950. |
| The vent holes at the top were hot and wet. Hawk stuck his hand in. |  |
| This is a little whitewashed chapel on a nearby volcanic island that has a hot sulphur spring. Our tour guide told us the fishermen keep their boats there overnight to get the bottoms cleaned. |  |
 | After our volcano hiking tour, we went ashore. You can get up to the village by walking, but I didn't want to get shoved aside by the donkeys. And I didn't want to dodge their droppings. Or you can take a donkey ride up to the top. Linda suggested we might have donkey sweat on our pant legs when we got up there, also no thanks. So we rode the cable car. |
| This is a view of one of the tiny streets, not wide enough for a car. They were crammed with shops. Linda told us the name of her favorite jewelry shop (Kallisti), so we dropped in there on our way back. |  |
 | We bought some beautiful gold earrings made in the shop from ancient Santorini relic designs. These used up most of my clothes budget for September, unless I can persuade Hawk that they come out of the travel budget. |
| We stopped for lunch in a cafe overlooking the bay and also the donkey trail because Hawk wanted to try the Santorini wine. Not great. Sometimes the air smelled a lot like donkeys, too. But our Santorini salads were fabulous: tons of cherry tomatoes cut in half, green olives, pickled round leaves that tasted like capers, goat cheese and cucumbers. Really good bread and olive oil, too. | |
 | The streets were paved with very small stones set in patterns, really pretty. |
| More street paving designs. |  |
 | We rode the cable car back down, looking at Crystal Serenity and the volcanic island behind her. |
| One more shot of the beautiful little town of Fira on Santorini. |  |
 | And one more shot of the unbelievably blue water of the Aegean. |