Serenity in Santorini...

We travelled from Rhodes to Santorini on a Blue Star Ferry, we ended up splurging (when we were still employed) on a Cabin and i'm so so soooo grateful that we did. It's a 9 hour trip with one stop in Kos, it's an enormous ferry, more like a cruise ship, and it was really comfortable. The cabins were surprisingly a good size and it was bliss to be able to have a shower. We bought internet (and watched Game of Thrones after it took 2.5 hours to load) and settled in for a good journey. At about 8pm the swaying started and got progressively worse through the night, I tried to sleep off the nauseousness but it was worse than the spinning feeling after a couple of bottles wine. We were happy to reach Santorini at 1am, but if I did it again, I would arrive during the day, it's so beautiful from the water.
We got in our transfer with another Asian women and her two friends she brought along. After trying to figure out the cost and where their hotel was, we were on our way… They were the first to get out and the Greek driver accidentally closed the door on the top of the older Asian mans head, which then started bleeding. It wasn't bad, more comical, we almost laughed when the Greek driver pointed them in the direction of the hospital and sped off.
We stayed in Firostefani at a beautiful place called Ellinon Thea. It was two levels with a jacuzzi in the bedroom looking out onto the bright blue water of Santorini. We were about a 10 minute walk away from Fira, the main streets of Santorini. The streets are all cobblestoned and quite steep in parts, we had a lot of fun navigating our way around Fira and looking at all the beautiful things that we couldn't afford on a travellers budget. We made the mistake of going down way to far and then having the issue of trying to get back up… I had to stop half way up a massive set of steps due to calf cramps, but don't worry I remedied myself with an ice cold beer and views of Fira. There were three cruise ships in Santorini that day, I can't imagine what it would be like in peak season!
As we had walked so much and it was so hot, we didn't end up eating lunch (always a downfall) and decided just on a cheese platter and bottle of wine… which was then quickly followed by another bottle and then another… so after a less than substantial lunch and no dinner, Alex and I were well and truly blind before the sun had gone down… which we watched and was beautiful. Oh, mum and Dad I wrote you a card during said drunken sunset watching, apologies in advance for spelling mistakes and soppiness, but make sure you frame the photograph, it was taken by a local photographer.
Safe to say that we didn't have our finest moments after we decided to go out, Alex fell down the marbles staircase at the hotel (he's fine, he'd already done it earlier that day not intoxicated) smashing his shin, he then fell down going down the cobblestone stairs to Fira as well, smashing his toe. I was slipping all over the place in my flats as well… Don't worry we didn't give Australian's a bad name, as we were pretending to be American's! We lasted one drink at some pub, inhaled some hot chips and then walked back up to the hotel (which neither of us remember) still saying "MERICA" to ensure that we weren't "those Australians".
Waking up after three cheap bottles of wine (as well as two tequila sunrises and two kamikaze shots)  is always horrendous, especially when you remember that you purchased a convertible Smart Car the day before… We pulled ourselves together and jumped in the car, which was surprisingly fun and nice to have fresh air and sun on your face. We drove to Oia then onto the Red Beach, where we had a  quick swim and sun bake then onto Perissa, where we lay under umbrellas, swam and ate, all helping to improve our hangover. We explored Perissa and had a slow drive back to the hotel.
After a quick episode of Game of Thrones (GoT watchers… its was horrific, i'm still thinking about it) we decided to go for a walk back into Fira and get some dinner. Santorini is a hub for cruise ships and it was a long weekend in Greece so it was packed, we ended up getting dinner from Asia Club (surprisingly we didn't die), we wanted something other than greek food as we have eaten it for lunch and dinner for the last 10 days. Fira is so beautiful, it's fun to get lost in it's little alleyways and shops, the views are incredible. The shopping was good too, Alex bought some cool new sunnies (his one splurge item, mine were my docs) and we wandered back to the hotel to pack :(
Our backpacks are awesome but we're beginning to find it difficult to fit everything in, we bought little plates and cutlery in Rhodes because we've been buying lunch items from the local supermarket. They should be handy in Ios, all in a bid to save as much money as possible.
Our next hurdle is to find a cheap way to get from Greece to Italy in early July, we hope we will find some seasoned backpackers at Francesco's in Ios to tell us the best way. Most of the trains in Greece aren't running because of the financial crisis so we will probably just fly as a bus from Athens to Corfu is 9 hours (yuck) then a ferry is just as long.
Now onto Ios...