Saturday, October 27, 2018 -- Santorini, Greece

Santorini, Greece -- A little bit of heaven; view of Thira, Riviera at left, and Oia in the distance. The white at top is the two towns; the white just below is a layer of limestone near the top of the volcanic lava layers.

We arrived at Santorini, southern edge of the Cyclades Islands, in a bit of haze and low clouds, but by mid-morning it was a glorious day.

Does this look like any vineyard you have ever seen?

First lesson was how to grow grapes for wine on this wind-swept island. Simple: you cover the young vines with a rigid basket, and let the grapevines grow and curl around inside the basket until they are all coiled up and still low to the ground. Then you let this coiled shape stay low, out of the wind, and in a shape that conserves water consumption (there is no water for irrigation here, and all drinking water is bottled and imported). The wine was delicious, probably the best in Greece.

Full-grown grape vines trained to stay low to the ground by the basket.

After the winery visit we rode to the northwest end of the island on the coast road to Oia, an absolutely charming, tourist-centric town perched on a cliff. We strolled the narrow pedestrian walks; you can't really drive to most of the hotels on the cliff, so need to consider your luggage load and how to get it down the steps carefully! We can see why this island is flooded with visitors in the summer, and were thankful we missed the summertime crowds as we drove the high road back to Thira. We also didn't have to deal with the typical 2-1/2-hour line to go up or down the cable car (only alternative to the donkey trail, more than 1000 steps from the water to the town of Thira, shared with beasts and their droppings).




View of Oia, built on a steep but lovely volcanic hillside. Note the dog in photo below watching the diners.

Incredible color of water in the Aegean sea.

Pedestrian street at Oia.

Your choices of ways to get from Thira at top back to sea level are the donkey trail at right  or the cable car at left.

Saturday evening we participated in a cooking class called It's Greek Tonight--making four dishes under the direction of Chef Annie in the ship's Culinary Center, each accompanied by the appropriate alcoholic drink.

Chef Annie with a new (to us), most efficient way to seed a pomegranate--slice horizontally in half, then beat the outside with a wooden spoon so that the seeds fall out into a bowl of water, where the seeds will float while the pith sinks!

Three of the four dishes we made.

Don't we look professional?