I have asked Jared about 10 times today to write the blog… then I resorted to begging. No luck. I don’t know why it isn’t something that I look forward to anymore, but it has become somewhat of a task. It may be because traveling the world is becoming less of a passion and more of an obligation as the last few days trickle by. I am going to keep it up though because I think it is a great idea for me to document the trip in a sense so that I can have a recollection on paper to remind me when I forget how awesome and out of my comfort zone and hard and eye-opening this whole thing has been. Anyway, this blog will be dedicated to our experience in Greece, particularly Athens although I will talk a little bit about Santorini as well.
We arrived in Athens on June 13th and we stayed until the 18th in a pretty low grade hotel. The rating on the hotel was good, and the price was REALLY good, so we booked it and we realized after just about 10 minutes there why the price was so good. We paid for a big room with a queen sized bed and a mini fridge and we were given two twin beds in a small room with no fridge. I went down to reception to ask about getting the room we paid for and they didn’t have one available so we had to spend the first night in the lousy room. We shared a tiny twin bed because we didn’t want to sleep apart. Call it young love or whatever you want, but the truth is we just love to snuggle. They moved us to the correct room the following evening with no offer to refund any of our money.
The neighborhood that our hotel was located in was probably the worst. We couldn’t walk to the grocery store without passing multiple passed out alcoholics and prostitutes. Taking a walk to anywhere was a huge chore because everyone we passed smelled terrible, especially to a prego lady. The body odor in our neighborhood was completely unreal. There was one building that we had to pass every day that had tons of stray cats living in it and I had to hold my breath to get past it. The buildings were the ugliest yet and the streets were the dirtiest. The biggest pro was the McDonald’s that was a 10 minute walk away.
Jared and I did spend one enjoyable day in Athens at The Acropolis seeing the city from above. Being within the city is kind of a disturbing experience, but seeing it from above is magical. It was really interesting to see the ancient ruins of what used to be a place of worship for the Greek people in the 1400’s. We also spent some time eating gyros and kabobs which is a classic Greek experience, and it was quite delicious although, I am not a huge fan of some of the sauces that they use.
We left Athens early on Saturday morning and we took an 8 hour ferry ride to Santorini. I was really worried about such a long trip on a ferry considering that I am prego, but luckily I felt awesome the whole day. It may have something to do with the fact that I had caffeine for the first time in 9 weeks. I didn’t even need my mid-day nap! I also did not feel sick at all, which was an answered prayer. I actually have felt wonderful for the last week… knock on wood. The ferry ride seemed to take forever though considering we were so anxious to arrive. The highlight of the trip was when 20 or so dolphins came to the front of the boat and were jumping in and out of the water leading the way. Seeing them do that is something I have always wanted to see! Dream come true.
The ocean here is so blue and the islands are all different shades of red, brown, black, tan, and orange rock. The water is amazingly clear and it’s really awesome how far down you can see. Our resort is really little, but in a great location. It’s only a 3 minute walk to the black beach. Our room is pretty nice although, once again, we have two twin beds! We pushed them together because they said there was nothing they could do about it. We also have a shower that is hilariously tiny. It is a 2 by 2 foot square on the floor with little ledges to trap the water (which don’t work) and a shower spout that you have to hold. No curtain at all so that every time I take a shower the entire bathroom floor is soaked. I think that tiny, ineffective showers and twin beds are just a European thing.
The Red Beach
I have a lot more to say about Santorini, but I am going to dedicate a separate blog to the island because so much has happened already and if I made this blog a combo of Athens and Santorini it would be unreadably long. I will fill you in on the basics of the island. I think this island is one of God’s most beautiful creations. Jared and I both love it here. The beaches are all different colors. We are staying on the black sand beach, but we drove today to the red sand beach which is beautiful in a completely different way. There is also a white sand beach down the road that has the best snorkeling, we are told. We rented a 4-wheeler for our entire stay, so that has been fun and it is wonderful to not rely on public transportation for once! It’s also great to not have to walk everywhere. We are treating Santorini like a vacation (except for we work every day for part of each day) because chances are we might not have a chance to be in a beautiful place just the two of us for quite some time. Also, yesterday was our 2 year anniversary so we did something amazingly fun and interesting yesterday, but I will write that post later on in the week because there is an awesome story about how a 9 weeks pregnant woman saved her husband’s life. More to come on this story.
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