Okay, so my 3 week long Euro trip with some of my best friends began on 21 June 2015. I still can't believe I was lucky enough to go, the whole organising process and decision to go happened so quickly, and next thing I was on a massive plane to Athens. So I had to start this daily blogging with how we got there because trust me, it was no easy task!
So we first had a 9 hour flight to Dubai. I was travelling with two of my closest friends Teagan and Kendal. I am so lucky that the three of us got along so well and so travelling with them was easy and we all seemed to sort of understand each other. The flight to Dubai was a long one! Usually I am fine with long flights, in fact, I usually love flying and Teags and I had got so excited to just have 9 solid hours to watch movies and tv series and all that because we literally finished exams the day before we left! I think the reason this flight was slightly more uncomfortable is because it left at 1pm and arrived in the early hours of the morning in Dubai (like 1am or so), so it was weird timing in terms of sleeping, and so none of us really got any sleep the whole flight. But anyway, we landed in Dubai and then had a further 9 hour layover before we left for Athens! This was difficult because it was from 1am till something like 9am the next morning, so it was a terrible time to be up, and sleeping wasn't really an option as there were no comfortable places and we always had to keep an eye on our bags. It was also bloody hot in Dubai, even at 1am it was like 43 degrees! So that was a bit of a struggle because at first it was really really hot inside, and then later in the night it became freezing- we kind of just moped about on the chairs and listen to music or chatted. I even tried to sleep on the super dirty floor at one point, haha but didn't really succeed. Dubai airport is also super over-priced (we paid 10 Euros for a McDonalds chips and coke- that's like R140!), so we didn't buy anything else! So it was a pretty boring 9 hours with no sleep or wifi, but anyway, it was fine in the end. In the last hour, we met up with our friend Andrew, who was joining us on the trip.
The next flight was about 4/5 hours to Athens. We didn't manage to get any sleep on this one either, but it was at least day time, so we watched movies and chatted and got excited for the next 3 weeks. Landing in Athens, we again stepped out and were hit by a wall of heat, which pretty much remained for the entire trip (but no complaining being back in freezing Cape Town at the moment!). We got our luggage (we were backpacking, so had a 15kg backpack with us for all the travelling, which proved both convenient and a massive mission simultaneously haha) and then got straight on a metro to the main port, Piraeus. It was interesting going on the metro, because we got to see little snippets of Athens speed past us as we went. Athens, the tiny bit I saw of it that day (we did go back at the end of the trip) was really different to what I had expected- it is super built up in areas and does actually have a lot of almost "shabby" suburbs that we saw as we went past on the metro. We hopped out at the port and bought a ferry ticket to Santorini. The only ferry leaving that day (because it was already quite late) was a 7 hour one- so we lugged our backpacks around to the other side (literally the other side) of the massive harbour and eventually got on our ferry. I will say that we were very relieved to be on the right ferry and Santorini-bound, because it had been a fairly stressful experience finding our way there and all that, but it was then that we could actually start to get really excited for our adventure! The ferry, as one would expect, took it's sweet time, and we bought wifi for a bit, to let our parents know we were safe and all that, and then kind of just explored the many floors and restaurants (it was a massive ferry with loads of different levels and spaces and stuff). We played cards and chatted and tried to pass the time, but unfortunately we just could not manage to sleep, despite like 30 hours without any sleep.
Arriving in Santorini, we were so relieved and excited to finally be there after a long couple of days of travelling! We got on a bus to take us to the city centre, which was right by our hostel- 7 of the people we were travelling with had arrived that afternoon, so had already settled in. We arrived at 1am or so, and the bus then took another 30-40 mins. I will say I was pretty terrified going up to the main town. Santorini is literally right on the top of like the steepest mountain, so going up the edge of a cliff in the pitch black in a bus is not exactly my cup of tea- haha round each corner I would literally just squeeze my eyes shut and just hope that we wouldn't fall off. This was not an irrational fear though, I promise there were times it literally looked like we were swinging straight into the rock haha. But finally we were up and over and eventually arrived at the bus station. So with our massive backpacks, we walked down the main road and luckily managed to find our hostel quite easily. I actually love hostels, sure, not the cheap mattresses and showers and all that, but I always have loved the vibe at them, lots of students all travelling, having fun, I don't know, I just think its so cool that wherever you're from, you're all there to have a good time and an adventure. We arrived and settled in to our room- it was a 10 sleeper room but luckily our group of 9 took up most of it. It was pretty simple and basic- just lots of bunk beds, but it did the job and so we unpacked only to realise that none of our fiends were there. The 10th girl staying in our room told us they had all gone out to a club/bar called Murphy's, so ridiculously, for some reason at 2am after like almost 48 hours without sleep, no showering and still in our travelling clothes and no makeup or anything, we decided that we'd join them as well haha. I suppose why not? So we walked up to reception and met A bunch of people from Australia and the US that were also staying at the hostel, we chatted with them for a bit and they said they were also going out, so we walked up with them to find the others.
This was my first sort of view of Thira- the capital (I assume) of Santorini. It is so beautiful, with a main road down the middle and then loads of cobbled streets and trees all around. The sea is pretty far away from the actual town (like probably not walking distance), but you could sea it in the distance. It was also so nice being so warm at night! So we wandered up the hill to Murphy's and were finally united with the others. Murphy's was very small but cute and cozy and played really good music, so we had a drink or two and danced and caught up with the others for an hour or so before heading back. My good friend Kath told me all about what they had done that day and we sort of all chatted about what to do the next day before heading to bed for the night. On exception of the room being suuuper stuffy (cause there were 10 of us in there with no windows), we all finally got a really good night's sleep!
I'll post about the second (but kinda first) day in Santorini in the next post.
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