Santorini, Greece – The Volcanic Island

During my 3-day cruise of the Aegean Sea, Santorini was by far the best island I visited.

Santorini, Greece is a small, circular island formed by a giant volcano, which erupted thousands of years ago. The explosion is supposedly the largest ever recorded in history and it was so big that it is rumored to be the source of the Atlantis legends.

While Santorini was once a full circular island, the inner portion of the island was blown out when the volcano erupted and today the caldera of the volcano has been filled in (for the most part at least) with sea water. Today, Santorini stands as one of the largest water-filled calderas on the planet (I believe it is the second largest – Crater Lake in Oregon being the first).

To get to the island, our ship dropped anchor in the center of the ocean-filled caldera and we boarded small shuttle boats, which dropped us off in groups at the Athenios harbor. From there, we were shuttled onto buses and driven to the cities of Oia and Fira Town (the island’s capital city).

In the cities we were free to do as we pleased. Both locations, however, were packed with tourists. The views were incredible and the architecture unique (as you can see from the photos/video below).

After just a few hours on the island we were forced to return to the boat… and there were three options on how to get back there.

1) You could take a cable car from the top of the island to the bottom.

2) You could walk down a long series of steps covered in donkey poop.

3) You could ride a donkey to the bottom (which was discouraged by our tour guide).

My travel companion, Leslie, didn’t want to walk… so she stood is a massively long line and waited for a ride down to the bottom of the island in a cable car. I, however, opted to walk!

For video and pictures from my trip to Santorini, just scroll down.

For more photos from my adventures in Europe, be sure to check out my Flickr stream.