Going Greek - Port of Ammoudi

As I've mentioned before in the Oia posts, the villages on Santorini all are perched on cliffs with the sea in the caldera directly below you. Below each main village is a corresponding port. The one below Oia is called Ammoudi.

We stared down at it for a couple of days until we decided it was time to go explore down there. Theoretically you could drive down, but we didn't have a car and that seems weak. So the two choices are to walk down 300+ cobblestone steps in a switchback pattern or take a donkey.

We decided to walk down and re-evaluate our mode of transportation once we were ready to come back up. We walked down with the intent to have lunch at the port, as there are at least 5 portside tavernas down there. As such, when we went down it was blazing hot and there is no where to hide in the shade during your 15 minute walk, so we were drenched with sweat.

Once there, we checked out each fish taverna and eventually settled on Dmitri's, mostly because DB~ liked its bright colors of the building. Our table was directly adjacent to the water. Like, if a fork fell off it was in the water, kind of adjacent. This led to DB~ and the girl at the table next to us both chumming the water with chunks of bread to get the little fish to all swim to it as a school.

Back home in the States, I'm not a huge fish guy. I like shrimp and will have some tilapia and swordfish, but overall I like my food to run away from me not swim away. But when in Rome...(or Athens...or Oia, I guess).

Side note - We were very surprised that fish was kind of expensive in Greece. You would think that having a whole sea surrounding the mainline and being on an island it would be plentiful and cheap, but it wasn't. Another odd thing is that all the fish are shown on the menu priced by the kilo. It's shocking to see $60/kilo for a fish, until you realize that you're only going to get a 1/4 kilo worth of fish.

DB~ ordered a seafood pasta dish that was linguini with mussels, scallops and shrimp. She sort of chickened out on ordering a fish that was caught fresh that morning. I went for it, though. Our waitress led me inside and showed me the case of fish and told me all their names. I went with a red mullet and got 300 grams worth (they weigh it in front of you on a scale).

The grill was right behind us and we watched a man toss it on a wood fired grill and cook it right up, after some rudimentary scaling of it, and then toss it on a plate with a hunk of lemon and a couple of vegetables.



As you can see, that's head and tail and all, including a whole mess of bones. Different than back home where you get a prepared fillet. I kind of felt a little ripped off paying for a whole bunch of "weight" that I wasn't going to eat, but oh well. It was worth it for the experience to try it.

So after lunch we stared back up the huge set of steps and decided there was no way in heck we were walking back up. A Greek man that only knew a couple of words of English asked if we wanted a donkey ride for 5 euros per person. We each got our own donkey (DB~ had this pretty white one, of course).



Let me tell you...you haven't lived until you've held on to a bridle of a donkey for dear life while you and your new wife take turns getting run into cobblestone walls by donkeys engaging in a blood feud up 300+ steps, all while a Greek man yells at them in Greek and beats them with a whip. Good times.

The password is "harrowing". That's...."harrowing".