Today we allowed ourselves a little bit of a sleep in before heading straight into the town centre of Thira. Our plan for today was to hire a quad bike/ATV for the day so we could scoot all around the island at our leisure, and not be beholden to the bus timetables (which as previously mentioned are a little bit unreliable). On the first day, we had stopped in a couple of places to ask for prices and as we returned to one of them, we got a big wave out of the lady shop owner - she recognised us.
She by far had the cheapest prices that we had come across (as it even said on her sign!) and so we started the process of hiring the ATV. She was only going to charge us €30 for the 310cc, which was at least €10 less than everywhere else, and we threw in insurance which brought it up to €37 in total. If you want to hire a quad bike out of Thira, definitely go to the lady in the shop next to Falafaland! She’s a star.
As Dan was dealing with the license and insurance, she invited me to start trying on helmets. I have a bit of a pin head, and I couldn’t find anything less than L or XL. “Want babies size?” She said, laughing. I eventually found an S which fit me nicely. Dan grabbed a helmet too and we were introduced to our chariot for the day.
I didn’t listen while Dan was shown all the instructions on how to drive it, and then we were told to get on, go down the street and put a bit of petrol in. “Bring it back with the same amount of petrol as is in it now.” Ok… should be easy enough? I was quite nervous - not because I don’t trust Dan’s driving, but because I’ve never really ridden behind a quad bike before, and you’re rather exposed to the elements, and god knows what other drivers were like. We jerkily set off - getting out fo the quad bike place was rather complicated with skinny turns, but Dan navigated it quite well considering! We stopped down the street to consult the map, and found a petrol station.
A man jumped up to fill up our tank for us. He asked us how much we wanted, and we said to full. “To full?!” He replied incredulously, and continued to question it. We had no idea how much that would be or whether we needed, and to full cost about €17 and was about 9.5L. Ok, good to know.
We did an about face and made our way to Oia. Dan did exceptionally well, it was a little jerky sometimes on the corners (which made me squeak) but all in all it was enjoyable. As the day got on, I totally relaxed and really loved it!
Not many people were in Oia when we arrived - we found a park easy enough and went straight to the postcard shot, only sharing it with a couple of other people who offered to take some photos of us. It was hot by now - there’s little shade in Oia, and the white washed walls are quite hard on the eyes!
We pottered around Oia, but there wasn’t a great deal to do (it’s mostly just tourist shops, to be honest), so we decided we would come back for sunset and head off down the island again. As it was getting close to lunch time, our next stop would be a restaurant Matt and Ellen recommended near the Red Beach called Cave of Solidas. The Red beach was literally at the other end of the island, so we weren’t sure exactly how long it would take to get there or whether we would need stops on the way. Back on the ATV, I was feeling considerably more relaxed and Dan had also settled in to driving.
We made a couple of short stops on the way to rest our hands and bums (I was alternating holding onto Dan’s waist but also onto the bars next to me - I didn’t want to distract him if there was a big bump and I squeezed him too tight!). Dan did an excellent job of navigating our way there while I just sat on the back with the wind in my helmet, enjoying the scenery. We knew that the restaurant was before the beach but the next thing we knew, we had turned off onto a road for Red Beach and landed in a parking lot. We seemed to have missed it. A quick google search showed it was 6 minutes in the backwards direction - well, we were so close to the Red Beach now we would do that first instead.
When we jumped off the ATV, we were presented with a beach with dirty black sand. “This is Red Beach, I guess”, Dan said. This didn’t seem quite right, and I could see people walking through the parking lot and up a hill. We wandered in this direction, past a few little shops selling slushies and other warm-weather-appropriate treats, and started the scramble up the rock face. Past a lovely “do not enter, risk of land slides” sign, where the rope had clearly been cut to allow people to go past.
With this in the back of our minds, we continued up the rocks and down the otherwise, and soon before us lay the Red Beach. It actually was red, from volcanic activity I believe - the sheer rock face behind in this bay (and this bay only - the one beside it was white) was a deep ochre red, and this lent the sand to also be a deep dark brown red. It contrasted nicely with the aqua water and after a few photos, we made our way down. This way down to the beach was far more intrepid, and I was pretty sure I was going to go arse up at some point. Thankfully this didn’t happen, and when we arrived on the beach we walked a little way to find a spot to sit. A patch of the beach was covered in what looked like straw - we weren’t sure if this had been put there specifically to make sitting more pleasant, or if it was plant material that had fallen from above as we could see something similar up the rock face.
The red sand itself was nice and soft, but surrounding the red sand was black rocks - smooth, but difficult to walk on. The bigger rocks were slightly easier but the black grit rocks were very sore underfoot. We found a little spot with lots of red behind us, lots of red before us, took off our shoes (and I took off my tights) and had a little paddle.
When we were done with our feet being wet, we sat back on our towel to let them dry. There was a strange rushing and crumbling noise behind us, and looking around - there was indeed a mini landslide on the red rock, pushing more fine red dirt towards the ocean - as well as a few quite large rocks. These rocks thankfully missed the folks sitting at the base of the rock face (it would have done a bit of damage!) and at this point, we thought it might be a good idea to mosey on, we were hungry and didn’t feel like being hit by falling rocks.
Dan decided that we would drive to the restaurant, even though my maps said it was only 6 minutes walk away, and I was quite glad of this. It took us a little while to realise that the bank of restaurants was right on the waterfront with no direct front access, so we parked and began walking along the front of the water. The Cave of Solidas was the 2nd restaurant in and we found ourselves an outside table which still had a nice view. As we walked up to it, I noticed a sign for a lunch deal and had already decided this was probably what I was going to have.
The lunch deal consisted of fresh fish of the day, dolmades and tomato, and a glass of wine. As Dan was driving, he wasn’t able to partake in any liquor, and he was also about to order this (with an exchange for soft drink) when we saw the waiter walk past with some grilled octopus. It looked and smelled delicious, so we went with 1 fish deal and the octopus, and would share.
We are slowly getting better at eating whole fish, and we slowly picked out all the bones while nomming on the octopus. It was a great, simple meal and I would highly recommend. When I went to pay, I followed our waiter who walked straight into the kitchen and started washing dishes. I stood there for a second thinking, “um..?” When the cook started laughing at me, asking me if I wanted to wash some dishes too. Everyone in the kitchen then turned to laugh at me, and I realised that I wasn’t supposed to follow him all this way but he hadn’t indicated where the cashier was so I had just kept going. Oops!
Back on the bike, it was time to find White Beach and the lighthouse. Somehow, we completely missed White Beach but we ended up at the lighthouse, which is the furthermost tip of the Santorini crescent. A few photos and back on the bike - I didn’t want to get blown off down the cliff face! On the way back, Dan found the turn off to White Beach. The road here suddenly turned into a dirt and rock road, and all of my jiggly bits were definitely jiggling, and I lost my breath a few times with some heavy potholes.
I guess I was excepted a White Beach, as the name would suggest, but it was more big black rocks on the ground and maybe some whiteish cliff faces? We knew we were in the right place because a few tour boats had pulled up, but it wasn’t quite what we thought it would be. There weren’t many people here, any shops or restaurants were totally shut, and so we sat on a rock for a little while and then made our way back to the ATV.
The day was getting late now and we wanted to catch the sunset in Oia. We tossed up whether we should see the Black Beaches - Red Beach lived up to its name, White Beach didn’t quite, would Black Beach? In the end, it wasn’t too out of our way so Dan navigated to the otherwise of the island, stopping when we reached the beach. In front of us was, in fact, black, sparkly, glittery sand. It was actually quite beautiful, and in some places had become rock-like. I could pick up whole chunks, and could crush it with a bit of force, leaving black glitter on my hands. It brushed off really easily, and left my hands feeling nice and soft.
We drove along the foreshore until Parissa, which is quite a little resort town and completely different to the rest of Santorini. The sand here was also black but was more gritty, so wasn’t nearly as beautiful as our first stop. This is where people go for the beach vacation on Santorini as the rest of the island is on a cliff face. There were a lot of people here sunbathing - not many swimming yet as it was a little cold for them still, and had a more meditteranian vibe.
We took some photos, hopped back on the ATV and waited for a car and a girl on another ATV to about turn and make their way out of the car park. We followed, but they zoomed off into the distance, trying to overtake everyone.
We stayed steady and with our 300cc’s and, with a skilled driver behind the wheel, it wasn’t long before we overtook their erratic 200cc’s. We made our way to Oia wth a couple of stops on the way to rest Dan’s hands and our bums - some parts of the road were particularly bumpy. To see a different part of the island, Dan turned off to take the road on the lower part, not on the cliff face, for a chance. This started off well until we hit a sign, “do not enter, road works” (well, essentially, it was in Greek). We had seen cars disappear this way already, and we could see cars ahead, so we just bumped our way down onto the unfinished road and continued along, occasionally passing cars coming in the other direction. It was particular bumpy and I was quite pleased when we finally hit the sealed road again! The houses along this part were already in full shade from the hill - it was only about 6pm - it wouldn’t be so nice to live on this side!
In Oia, we found a park relatively easily, considering the place was now teeming with tour buses, Sunset - of course. Everyone comes out in droves at sunset. A cruise ship had arrived earlier in the day and we were pretty sure they had been deposited here at Oia via all the buses. We thought that the “picture perfect” spot for the sunset would be too overrun with people, so we walked across the front of the town, to find ourselves basically at the same spot as last night. Hmm, not ideal. We kept going until we hit the “picture perfect” spot which is in the old fort, to find it already 1 layer deep of people sitting all around the outsides. Many Asian tourists and a lot of girls in skimpy clothing getting ready for their Instagram photos lined the fort walls.
This wasn’t relaxing at all. Dan stayed put while I went to see if there was anywhere better but returned to where he was standing. He staked a spot behind two tourists who ended up sitting down for most of the sunset show - which was excellent as we could shoot over their heads. Some risqué professional photographers with their fancy equipment had scaled the fence and were sitting on the otherwise of the wall, in the do not sit part.
The sun started to lower, and the crowds became two, three people deep, and pushing and shoving to try to take photos. One Chinese man became so pushy behind me - he even rested his big “professional” camera on my shoulder to take photos! I gave him some choice words, and he retreated….to stand next to Dan and start harassing him instead. The sunset was indeed beautiful - although I think our sunset the night before was even better. The sun became an orange ball in the sky, and dipped behind a little island before poof! It disappeared completely.
Now the sky went a beautiful pinkish shade, so as the droves of people left, we stayed around to take a few more photos - this was the best time to take pictures of the town on the rock face as the sky behind turned lovely pink and purple shades.
We decided to leave before it got pitch black and Dan would have to fight for space on the roads with the big tour buses. Once out on the highway though, we got stuck behind a touring mini-bus which was fine - it determined the pace and we couldn’t get past it - nor could anyone else. We had quite a convey behind us when we finally reached Thira!
Time for dinner, so we tried to find a park near the main square and ended up quite a distance away. As it was a nice night, everyone was out wanting dinner! We nabbed the last parking spot in the supermarket carpark (to the point where people were asking us if we were leaving…er, no, we just got here! No luck for you, sorry!) and walked back into the square. We passed a lot of places on the way, but all we really felt like was a gyros and we needed a cheap feed. There had been a gyros shop that we had passed a number of times, so this time we tried it. I had the chicken gyros for a change and it was amazing. I think it’s my favourite so far. We sat on a bench, scoffed our gyros, and wandered back to the main square. A tourist shop was still open, and so we had a bit of a peek, Dan getting himself his postcards but I couldn’t find a magnet I liked. That’s not quite true - I found one, but it wasn’t in good condition and I couldn’t find any others the same. I figured if I couldn’t find anything on the morrow I’d be able to come back to this store.
Turning off into our street, Dan suddenly pulled over, and told me that the bike had just turned itself off. Ok…that’s not great. But it turned back on again easily enough and we were away again - I think the “on” spot was a little loose and the key had just wiggled itself out of position, turning the ATV off.
We pulled into the undercover parking space of our hotel, and had to duck. We somehow hadn’t realised it was so low! I could stand up underneath it but of course Dan had no hope! It was very noisy and if anyone was sleeping, we definitely woke them up.
And here ends our day hooning around the island. It really was the best way to see it and I can fully recommend hiring an ATV, especially from the little lady next to Falafaland, as you can get to all the hard-to-reach sites with the wind in your hair!
Til next time,
xx
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