October 9th, 2002 (Wednesday)

Wednesday, we were planning on diving in Kamari, on Santorini, so we got a hotel in Kamari. But, the dive shop was closed for the day. Our next plan was to rent scooters for the day, but they wanted us to have motorcycle licences in the US. Unfortunately, I took the class so that I'd know how to drive a scooter if I was ever on an island and wanted to rent one, but I'd never taken the written test at the DMV to get the "M" on my license! Damn!

We rented a car instead -- a tiny Fiat Sceicento with a canvas, retractable sunroof. We drove up to Ancient Thira. The road was really switchback-y!

Looking down at the Kamari beach, it looked like a parking lot with its black pebbles and the parallel, multi-colored umbrellas and lounge chairs.

Here's a random snapshot of some of the ruins.

There wasn't much explanation of the site, so we made a statue of Machelle.

Then drove around Santorini. We stopped at a lighthouse and climbed around to the cliffs behind it and looked down. These pictures are taken from the coast side of the lighthouse.

Then, we went to the town of Ia near the northern tip of the island. Ia is has a lot of "traditional" dwellings, white-washed, rounded houses, frequently cut into the cliff face and connected with tiny, twisty roads. We watched the sunset set from the old Kastro ("castle") wall, then had dinner at the nearby Kastro restaurant. (I think you should try another restaurant.)

We ran into Michelle and Tamara again at the restaurant! We gave them a ride back into Fira where they were staying, stopping to look at the stars on the way. We looked in their cliff-face room. From the inside, you couldn't tell it was in the cliff -- it had normal walls.


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