Stunning Santorini

Well, the trip the islands began in the most auspicious way possible: a sea voyage by night. Is there any better way to travel than by boat? We boarded the ferry at 10:30, after waiting in Piraeus for most of the day. That was one shit heel town, a true port, filled with the low life riffraff you expect to find in such a place. We stuck close by the harbour, but the one time we went to get groceries, we saw large groups of unemployed youth, junkies, theives; all sorts of colourful characters.
The boat was (obviously) a night ferry. After hustling on board (a typical European free for all, as lines, or the vague concept of order, do not exist), we set up on the very top deck. After a meal of salami, edam cheese, and fresh bread, we lay out for the night one plastic benches near the prow. The sea breeze was gorgeous, and it was actually a very pleasant sleep, moreso than I had anticipated! Sadly, the boat was well lit, so the stars were not out in abundance, but you could see a few if you really strained. In order to keep my gear safe, I slept on my pack as a pillow, and tied my carry on (which has all my important things) to my chest. As I said, I slept well, which when looking back, was strange.
I cannot stress enough, just how thrilling it is to be abroad, sailing the Aegean at night. The air is filled with the tang of salt, the breeze is refreshing, but temperate, the boat lists gently under foot. Truly wonderful.
We called into Paros, Naxos, and Ios, before arriving at Santorini at 9:30 ish. As we saild into the Caldera (the massive mouth of the old volcano), we could not see the tops of the cliffs, as they were shrouded in cloud. As we ascended the slopes on a bus, it was like driving into the sky, as we entered the clouds, and the view of the port was lost below us in a sea of mist. We located our campground (about 500m from the bus station), the clouds lifted, driven off by the heat of the day. We set up, and noticed that the large group beside us that was sleeping out under the stars, was comprised of many attractive French teens, who had no trouble wandering the camp in their underwear...awe, what a way to begin your day. Sadly, they did not speak English, as we found out. Oh well.
Later in the day, we headed up into Fira, the main town on the Isle. Our camping is in Fira, but on the side facing away from the Caldera. The streets are packed with little shops, tavernas, pubs, you name it. It is a commercial trap that clings to the very edge of its 1000 ft cliff. We stooped and had lunch at a promising looking Taverna. My meal was the best I had yet had. Large chunks of pork that had been slow roasted in the oven in lemon sauce, until they were literally falling apart they were so tender. They were served on rice, and covered in gravy. I am hungry again just talking about them! Of course, the taverna was a rip off, though as they charged us over 7 euros just as a "sitting" fee, so they meal cost almost 30 euros! That, if you don't know, is a lot of money...at least the food was good.
We wandered the town for most of the day, and then returned at night just to stroll its winding streets. Many cruise ships call in for the day, and then leave again at night, creating a lot of hustle and bustle all through the day. Fira is a very hectic place. Earlier in the day, we had descended to the base of the cliffs to the port of Fira Skala. There were 3 cruise liners in port, as well as 3 luxury yauchts (one of which had 5 decks, was 100 ft long, etc, easily 50+ million dollars).
Santorini is a geological wonder. Thousands of years ago, there was a large civilization based on the isle, the Cycladaeic civilization. Then, the island, which was really a massive (and I mean MASSIVE) volcano blew, utterly distoying the Cyclaedic civ., as well as the Minoan civ on Crete. Many scholars now believe that the Cycladaeic civ was the famous Atlantis, but too little remains to confirm that. The result of that eruption is striking. The mouth of the volcano is now several km wide, and filled with water (the Caldera). The sea in it is deep, hundreds of feet, in fact. Swimming in it is otherworldly. If you swim out 5 feet from shore, the water is 15 ft., 10 ft. from shore, it is 40 ft., and then, it just drops off, straight as a begger can spit, down into the depths. The colour of the water as you swim is like nowhere else. Take a brilliant noon time sky, and make it bluer, deeper, more intense, and yet, softer, muted, and that is the colour of the Caldera water. The cliffs jut straight out of the Caldera, rising for over 1000 ft, straight up, and all along the cliff tops towns cling to the edges. It is an amazing place to see...very pretty. Interestingly, the two small isles in the centre of the Caldera are still active volcanos. Nea Kameni, the larger of the two, last blew lava into the sky 50 years ago.
The following day we hiked along the edge of the cliff tops around from Fira to Oia, a less commercial town, but infinitely more pretty. The walk was stunning, as you were on a trail literally at the edge of the cliff face. Along the way we met these two girls, Mandy and Erin, who had just finished law school in LA. Erin was from Orange County, and Mandy was from Toronto. We hiked with them until Oia, then we went to swim in the Caldera, and they went their own way. Later, we saw them again, and the 4 of us weatched the sun set from a bar right on the cliff face. (Oia is famous for its sunsets). That was a nice treat, since Mandy was gorgeous...she used to be an actress, and moved to LA to act, which she did for 3 years, then she went back to school to take law. I have spent worse evenings, with lesser company. Later we had dinner at camp, and I chatted with our waitress, an interesting girl from Poland, who is working on Santorini for her summer break from university. She had some interesting views on Poland joining the EU - it is a good thing, so long as Poiland does not adopt the euro, as it would create a big gap in society, as it has done in Greece - the euro is worth 4 Polish dollars(?), and would bring prices up, but not wages. It also helped that she was an eastern European goddess...all told, a great day.
Today, we are taking the boat to Crete, and have a lot of time to kill.