Getting to Studios Markakis on Santorini!

On the ferry, I continued my 500 Rummy winning streak, though Kristine won a best of 3 games of Gin. We ate better on the ferry than anywhere else during the trip. While relatively expensive according to normal standards, the food on the ferry was dirt cheap compared to where we had been eating and I was more full than I have been since we left home.

When we got off the ferry, there were several people waiting to give taxi rides or book you in their hotel. We asked one of the hotel salesman how to get to Fira, he said to take the local bus, and Kristine confidently got onto a bus (more coach bus than public transportation bus) and sat down. There was only 2 other people on the bus and we started moving almost immediately after we had sat down, before having paid a cent or confirming that this bus was in fact going to Fira. After zig-zagging up the steepest of slopes and driving through the darkness, the bus eventually stopped and we got off. Luckily, it ended up being less than two euros each. As we paid, we asked where Fira was and got a hastily pointed finger down the road. This was looking like bad news.

After we wandered in the general direction the bus driver had pointed, we stopped at a shop to ask for directions. The shopkeeper didn’t know anything about Hotel Markakis, but directed us to a travel agency a few doors down. The travel agent ended up being quite nice and told us fairly solid directions up until the point where she said to turn down the alley toward the hotel after a small market. Not feeling too confident, we headed off down the hill, took a left and looked for a small market. To our relief, we found the market and a sign for the hotel without much trouble. That was wayyy too easy. The owner/receptionist at the hotel is incredibly nice and showed us to our room. He was embarrassed to admit that he had made an error in the reservation and apologized repeatedly that we would have to switch rooms tomorrow morning. It wasn’t all that big of a deal, because we jumped in bed and crashed, keeping as much as possible in our backpacks to make for an easy move tomorrow.