Today was our last planned activity day. Bags packed the night before, itinerary written up, map consulted and alarm set for 7am we jumped out of bed at the sound of the alarm in anticipation of what the days adventures would have in store.
At 8am we headed out to pick up our rental car, a little white Smart car. In our excitement we promtly headed off up the wrong side of the road which led to a dead end. Oh dear, not the best start! Come on Maice, you’re navigating! A quick turnaround with one ‘tut’ from another road user and we were off to our first stop of the day….the bakery! You cannot have an adventure day without a donut. We also treated ourselves to a couple of spinach and cheese pies as well…..to keep us going for the next eleven hours.
All stocked up, we drove off to item two on the itinerary; Mesa Gonia, the ghost town. We hopped out of our air-conditioned car, bottles of water and cameras at the ready only to run out of battery after a couple of snaps. Thankfully we’d brought spare batteries with us and after an enjoyable time looking around the empty and crumbling buildings we hopped back in the car and drove about twenty feet to our next stop, a café we used to go to when guiding. It was located in amongst the vine yards and was lovely….just a shame it was closed! We sat outside anyway and ate our donut and were joined by a very friendly kitten.
Our next stop was a bit of a damp squibb. It was a large store that sold absolutely everything apparently only today it didn’t quite sell what we were looking for so now well ahead of schedule we zoomed off to the inland village of Pyrgos to visit the old fort. We squeezed into the last parking space and set off, returning to the car at least three times to collect things we’d forgotten, then made our way up the narrow cobbled lanes keeping just ahead of the Japanese and American tour groups. We were by now in need of a frappe and found a lovely café with pink chairs, sat down, placed our order and then commenced with our favourite pastime, people watching over our frappes. It was fascinating. We witnessed the biggest fashion faux pas, an American tourist, in her sixties wearing pink kitten heel sandals, swimsuit bottoms and two tops……can’t see that fashion catching on!
We left Pyrgos and headed off to Santo Winery, situated on the edge of the caldera, for a spot of wine tasting. Although it was only 11am wine tasting had to be done so we could cross it off our list. After being duly seated at a table with a panoramic view of the Caldera a tray of six glasses of wines and some nibbles appeared. It should be noted that as the driver, Angela had only one very tiny sip from each glass whilst Maice consumed the rest. A methodical approach was taken to the tasting of the wine from sniffing, swilling and sipping and started from the left, taking each glass in turn and then back to the beginning….Maice continuing with the wine whilst Angela sampled the mineral water! After a long while it became apparent that we were both so engrossed and fascinated by the Japanese tourists posing and taking pictures of themselves and each other, that we’d stopped conversing with each other, fascinated by this spectacle.
We left the winery with Maice feeling rather tipsy and headed to the fishing village of Vlychada. Water bottle and cameras in hand we walked around the harbour, took a few snaps and made it back to the car in record time. It was very hot, we were weary and Maice was still tipsy.
We’d come to the conclusion that getting in and out of the car, opening and closing the boot, trudging around in the heat and taking photos was hard work so as it was now late afternoon a swim and a siesta was in order. We ended up at the beach at Perivolos, arranged ourselves on our sunbeds and subsequently fell asleep. It was almost 7pm when we left the beach, eager to head off to the lighthouse on the south of the island where we were going to watch the sunset. Leaving the beach we’d gone commando so had to be careful for any breeze that may lift our dresses, we didn’t want to expose ourselves to all and sundry, although we were quite sure there wouldn’t be many people at this end of the island. Well, imagine our surprise when we got there and found it just as busy as it is in Oia. We found a boulder to sit on and watched the sun go down……and very nice it was too.
Back home we decided to have a night in playing rummy and drinking G&T’s, Angela having a couple of doubles to make up for her alcohol free driving day. Soon we were overcome with the munchies so a trip to the mini-market was in order where we really pushed the boat out and bought a bag of chilli and lime crisps and some cheese. We certainly know how to eat well!
After our activity day we went to bed looking forward to a lazy day on the beach the next day. You know, you can never have too many beach days in a holiday!
Good night…
M&A xx
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