Day 9: Santorini, Greece

We docked in Santorini early this morning, and Charlie took some photos.

You can see the lights of Kira, the capital

The zigzag path for pedestrians and donkeys

We were dressed and in the Retreat lounge by 7:20 to await our tender boat.  I was nervous because there were high winds, with windchills in the 40s.  For the record, I wore a long sleeve tee, a wool sweater, and a windbreaker and was glad for all the layers!

The tender rocked alarmingly as people boarded, but the 20-minute trip to the dock wasn’t rocky at all.  We boarded a large bus with 18 others and drove to Oia (pronounced E-uh) on the opposite end of the island.  The bus made many hairpin turns up the mountain, and the views were amazing.  We climbed up a lot of steps to this area with shops, then wound our way through the paths between buildings, admiring the views.








These flowers were everywhere!

We stopped in a restaurant for coffee and wonderful bread bread with butter and honey. 


View from the restaurant 

Then we walked back down to the bus and rode to Kira, the capital city.  Our guide led us through the city to show us the cable car station, for those who wanted to return that way later.  The restaurant was just around the corner from the cable cars.



We enjoyed a wonderful lunch of local foods, including these two spreads for the rustic bread, on of fava beans and the other made with fish.


The shrimp saganaki was SO good!

Shrimp saganaki

Excellent Greek salad

Sea bass with rice

Our last view before leaving Kira

Then we rode the cable cars down to the port (no lines!), which took literally one minute. We quickly boarded a tender, but got bounced around for a while as another tender was boarding passengers when we returned to the ship. Charlie took a little video to illustrate the movement. 


We really enjoyed getting to see such beautiful places!  Tomorrow we have a “Food on Foot” tour in our last port, Mykonos.  I will not be stepping on a scale anytime soon after eating my way across Europe. . .  That’s all for today.


Comments

  1. RachelApril 18, 2026 at 6:32 AM

    Amazing photos! The food looks epic. I would also like to return there when it’s not 95 degrees.

    ReplyDelete
  2. EleanorApril 18, 2026 at 6:54 AM

    WOW that Greek salad looks so good! I like mine to be 50% feta

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ice Skating and Sushi

Image
Yesterday afternoon, we went to the ice-skating show, which was Tarot-themed. Costumed skaters portrayed the Lovers, the Empress, the Joker, etc.  We were as impressed with their skills as we were with the skaters’ on the Wonder in March. Lots of fancy spins, lifts, and jumps! Charlie told me that our ship (Voyager, launched in 1999) was the first in Royal Caribbean’s fleet to have an ice performance rink. There are servers who bring you drinks, so Prosecco it was!  We had reservations at Chops Grille for dinner, and we enjoyed our meal as the sun set. We both tried the appetizer crab cake (not as good as Charlie’s), the lobster bisque (okay), then petite filets with baked potatoes and asparagus. Once again, we failed to capture a pic of the excellent chocolate cake with ice cream.  As I mentioned yesterday, ship’s time moved ahead another hour, but so far we’re adjusting all right. We did have some loud noises overnight from the pool deck on the deck above ours. It sound...
Read more

And We're Off Again!

Image
Our highly anticipated trip this time is a month long, as we're taking back-to-back cruises from Vancouver to Hawaii, then on to Sydney, Australia! Royal Caribbean is repositioning Anthem of the Seas for the summer season Down Under.  Yesterday morning at 6:15 a car picked us up to head to the airport.  An hour later, we were through Security and settled into the airport lounge.  We had worried a bit about the government shutdown's impact on TSA and/or the airport itself, but at that hour, at least, all was well.   We tried to pack lightly for this month-long trip, but we didn't attempt to carry on everything. Here's Charlie's luggage: And here's mine: In Charlie's defense, his shoes are bulkier -- I only packed a pair of sandals in addition to the shoes I was wearing -- and he packed a good bit of handy stuff for the cruise ship that we'll both use. The flight to Vancouver went smoothly, although we were a little late leaving. Consequently, our "br...
Read more

Tuesday, Day 3, Fjords Cruise

Image
Today is another sea day, on our way to Molde, the northern-most port on this cruise.  Here’s where we were about 11:00 this morning: As you might expect, it’s chilly and windy outside, and the morning was very gray.  But we have blue skies this afternoon. Last night we met the Kimbros at Giovanni’s Table for a nice dinner. I chose the garlic shrimp served over mashed potatoes as my entree, and it was delicious. My dessert was the chocolate-hazelnut cake, also yummy. This morning we had breakfast in Chops Grille, then spent time in the suites lounge, mostly to give our room attendant a chance to clean our room.  We met Rachel for the afternoon ice show, and she took some great photos of the amazing skaters. Waiting for the ice show to begin  Tonight’s dinner will be at Chops Grille. Tomorrow morning we dock early at Molde. Rachel and Rob are planning a hike, and we’ll explore the town on our own.  More tomorrow!
Read more