Epic Europe Trip 2014 Day 10: Goodbye to Quiet Santorini
It was a sad morning in room 31 at the Cavanes Oia Hotel and Suites as we packed up our stuff to end what was a tremendous week in Santorini. We both woke up a little after seven and immediately went to packing up and getting ready for our flight to Athens. After getting most everything packed we ordered breakfast and enjoyed our last few glimpses of our amazing view.
After we got done with breakfast we both continued to clean up and do the final touches on packing. After that came the waiting game We were able to get a late checkout at 1PM but our ride to the airport didn't leave until 3PM. So while Jenn finished yet another book (The Confessions of a Shopaholic) I worked on my blog and went through a lot of our pictures. Once 1PM rolled around we packed up our stuff and dropped them off in the lobby.
We ended up leaving the lobby to what turned out to be a deserted Oia. It was a bit eerie. Most hotels consider October 31st the end of the season (not our hotel) so the shops and nearby restaurants do the same. Almost all of the shops that were bustling yesterday and that we visited were now closed and from what we understand are closed until the season starts back up in 2015. Sort of a weird experience that's for sure.
The good news was our new favorite cafe that we frequented yesterday was still open and we joined them for a third time. We started out with some fresh bread (right out of the oven) which was out of this world. We then split a cheese pizza which was great. Instead of sauce they just put slices of tomatoes which were great. Jenn ended up getting a hot chocolate to close off the wonderful last meal in Santorini.
We then walked back to our hotel, printed out our boarding passes, and jumped in a Mercedes can to take us to the airport. I'm not sure if I mentioned this on our arrival into Santorini but the Santorini Airport is ridiculously small. There is only room for one flight at a time and you can't leave more then a two seater plane at the airport. So a flight will come in from Athens drop off its passengers, leave the engines running and board passengers to take them back to Athens. We boarded our flight a little after 4PM and were in Athens a half hour later.
When we were in the Athens airport last week we scouted out where our hotel was where we'd be staying the night before going off to Rome. We searched everywhere for signs for the hotel and couldn't find anything. So finally Jenn broke down and asked someone and sure enough all we had to do was go outside and the gigantic Sofitel was right in front of our face. So right after we got our bags (which were the last off the plane again) we walked right out the double doors into the gorgeous Sofitel. We got a very nice room on the third floor overlooking the airport.
After doing a video room tour, we went downstairs and had dinner at the hotels restaurant. For a hotel restaurant it was actually quite good. Jenn got her go-to spaghetti with tomato sauce and I had an asparagus risotto. It hit the spot.
After dinner we came back to our room, Jenn took a nice long shower and we watched a couple episodes of New Girl before calling it a night and trying to get some sleep before the next part of our journey begins. Roma!
