“You’ve had your fun, now pay for it!”

Remember the post about the time we went to Turkey, The Real Rulers of Istanbul...[are cats]?

In nearby Greece, it is The Dog.

 

They are everywhere. Some, very few, have collars. They are all friendly and healthy looking and very much a part of Athens as well as the one island we went to, Santorini.

They don’t bark or beg, we tried to feed one of them some leftover gyro, but he refused. I guess they get just as tired of them as we do.

We’d be walking around touring the place and a few would tag along, then they’d inch their way ahead of us as if to say, “Follow us, we’ll show you all the good stuff.

And we’d end up in a place like this…

…their favorite restaurant.

That’s pretty much how relaxed this trip was, just wander around and discover.

Going to the Greek Isle of Santorini (Thira) was like jumping into a post card rack. This was the first time I’d taken my digital SLR on a trip so I was pretty much smiling the entire time. Just about every minute on that island was a photo op. We were all smiling. Blane was happy because the dollar to euro was better than it’s been in years, Kara found a bunch of caves to discover, and Spanky got to see many of the things she learned about in her humanities class (but that was more in Athens).

Our hotel offered a free boat ride and volcano tour, something we thought for sure would be a let down. It being free, you know.

So when we got to the port (800 steps down a cliff, thank you treadmill) and we were sure this was our boat:

But it was this one.

Out on the water, I saw blues like I’d never seen before. Suck the breath out of you blue.

The beaches there are black sand from the volcano,

and I’m thinking that might be what gives the water that deep blue color.

On the way back from the port, we rode the donkeys back up the cliff.

Notice I’m wearing my coat. It was a little chilly, but not too bad.

At the top of the cliff we watched the sunset every evening.

Other days we drove around in our rental car.

Discovered all sorts of things.

Seaside villages…

And timeless looking things, such as this old donkey…

Notice the lack of tourists? The season didn’t start for about a month so we had the place to ourselves. 

So. Perfect landscape, gorgeous blue waters, tourist free, no rain, no dogcatchers…

I told the girls it was all too good to be true, that any minute some guy would crack a whip at us and say, “You’ve had your fun, now pay for it!” and turn us into donkeys like in this scene in Pinnochio.

Then we got to talking about all the stray dogs and how they won’t eat gyros… and Spanky asked, “What kind of meat won’t a dog eat?”

DOG!

We were a little drunk that night. I had this little bottle of ouzo (a Greek liquor) in my backpack and Spanky had this hacking cough. It was late and all the drugstores were closed, so I thought, grampa’s cough syrup.

We all had a little of that.

After this part of the trip was over, we flew back to Athens where Sophia met us at the airport and escorted us to our hotel which was not too far from her house. Unfortunately one of her twins was ill, so we didn’t get to go out that night. The next day, Sophia met us at our hotel and escorted us back to the airport where we had some coffee and a long visit before catching our plane. What an amazing girl, that Sophia.

We didn’t turn to donkeys, but Blane, Spanky, and I ended up sick like dogs after we got home. Probably picked up some bug in the airport. We’re all better now and our fun has been paid in full.

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