From Santorini to Paros

We arrived at the port to leave for our ferry to Paros about an hour and a half early. We were told to allow an hour for travel since traffic around the port can sometimes be super busy but then our driver was half an hour early and there was no traffic!

So we spent our last hour on Santorini sitting in the sunshine watching the tourists come and go on day excursions around the island. You can always tell the American tourists!

It was so windy and the sea was really rough, I would not have wanted to be going out on a smaller boat that day.

Our ferry arrived at 3.30 p.m. and we got ready for boarding. I was not prepared for how huge it was. After docking, it unloaded about 6 trucks and heaps of cars, plus hundreds of passengers. Seeing how rocky the sea was, I was glad we were getting on such a huge ship.

We had just normal economy class tickets, which are pretty much just sit anywhere you can find a free seat. You could upgrade to an airline style seat for a few extra euros, but the trip was only 3 hours, so we couldn't really see the point of it.

However, we did pay for the slight upgrade to nicer seats on the ferry from Paros to Athens, sitting in those chairs is not that comfortable for more than a couple of hours... plus, there were crowds of people wandering past all the time which got annoying.

Bradley enjoying the ferry trip...

It was a pretty smooth ride, I didn't get too seasick. Sometimes the waves were so huge they came up to the third storey or the boat, so I wandered outside for some fresh air and to take some photos. Not so much fresh air since everyone sitting outside was smoking..

They had some good food on the boat though, we had some yummy chocolate chip and peanut brownie biscuits, and some good Greek coffee.

View of Naxos port, the boat stopped here between Santorini and Paros. Naxos is so close to Paros, you can actually see Naxos from the shore of Paros.

The Temple of Apollo

View of Paros port from the ship. We were standing there waiting for them to dock, and they lowered the ramp while we were still a fair way from land. So we got a great view of the ocean.

The owners of the hotel where we were staying picked us up from the port in Parikia town. We were staying on the opposite side of the island, in Naoussa. The place we stayed was a bit out of town, but the owners were happy to drop us off or pick us up whenever we wanted.

The view towards Naoussa from our room

The lovely view of the sunset from our balcony

We had dinner literally on the beach at a little place in Naoussa town, recommended by our hotel.  It was only when going to pay that I realised I'd left my wallet in our room at the hotel!!! It was so embarrassing, I was convinced we'd have to wash dishes or they'd think we were lying and trying to skip out on the bill! But it was fine, they said we could come back the next night and pay then. They were so nice to us we went back the next night, obviously to pay, but also to have another yummy dinner. They made the nicest courgette balls, and really yummy Potato and Crab salad.

Realising I don't have my wallet..

View from our table on the beach