5/11 Santorini, Akrotiri

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY! After a buffet breakfast at our hotel, we got a fairly early start. We met a tour guide and bus at 8:30 a.m. for a tour of Akrotiri, a site at the other end of the island. On our ride over there, our Greek tour guide told us a lot about the island of Santorini. Our photo of the grape plants is significant because, as our guide told us, around seventy percent of the island is covered with these plants. According to him, the only two "industries" on the island are tourism and wine. Santorini is famous for their wine. There is an abundance of churches and chapels on this island. We learned from our guide that if people build a church on their property and then build their house, they can claim that the house belongs to the church and then be exempt from taxes on their property. We arrived at Akrotiri, an amazing site. "Thirty-seven centuries ago," Santorini's volcano erupted, covering the island with volcanic rock and ash. The village of Akrotiri was completely covered. In 1965, a Greek professor happened upon the site and began excavations in 1967; they still continue today. Much of the site has a roof (held up with scaffolding) covering it to protect it. The people of Akrotiri were quite civilized for their time. They had indoor bathrooms, three-story buildings, and wooden frames around windows and doors to maintain their shape. We have one picture of a "door for short people;" our guide explained that the people then were much shorter--maybe only 3 or 4 feet tall. After our tour of Akrotiri, we stopped at a scenic viewpoint with the caldera (the volcano's center--a separate island now) in the background. We then drove to a spot from which we all hiked up to a castle-- there was a prime view from the top. We took several photos, and after boarding the bus, continued on to our hotel for the afternoon. Again, there were some who sunned by the pool and some who explored the town. We again had a buffet dinner at the hotel. Afterward, several of us attempted to get a game of basketball or ultimate frisbee going, but there was not a basketball or frisbee to be found on the island--or at least in Kamari.