5 Things I wish I packed for Greece

5 THINGS I WISH I PACKED FOR GREECE

When I was packing for Greece it was still fairly cold in Minneapolis, yes it was the end of April but legit there was still snow on the ground. So I was totally ready for all the dresses, bikinis and shorts. I usually pack really well and bring something for every occasion but for Greece it’s like I was so excited to go I lost all common sense when it came to what I put in my suitcase haha… Here are some things that I wish I would have packed, along with one thing I was so glad that I did pack.

THINGS I WISH I HAD PACKED

• A sweatshirt! It seems simple but I didn’t bring one and it was very chilly at nights, especially when we were on the ATV! It was actually so cold that we bought the typical touristy sweatshirts that say Santorini on them and we paid an unspeakable amount for them haha please avoid this and bring your own sweatshirt. Literally just picture Dustin and I riding on an ATV across Santorini at night with our sweatshirts on hahaha ohhh the memories though.

• A big hat - I wish I would have brought one, we spent a lot of time at the beach. I am not usually a hat person at all, but I ended up buying one in Mykonos to cover my face. It actually doubled as a photo prop so it was an easy $10 to spend!

• More rompers/practical clothes - I only packed one romper that wasn’t super dressy and ended up wearing it like 6/11 days we were there. It was perfect to wear because we were getting on and off the ATV and moped the whole time. I wish I would have brought more practical clothing. There was a lot of walking and yes I wanted to look cute but I also needed to be more realistic!

• A wrap - I ended up buying a wrap because the nights were very chilly! I used this to cover my arms at night and also as a blanket. I also used it to sit on when we would get back to our ATV or moped. The seat would get really hot so I sat on it and no problem! We kept calling it the wrap of many uses because it came in handy so many times!

• Sunglasses - This might be a no brainer to most people but somehow we both needed them so badly. I luckily brought a pair but Dustin didn’t and ended up buying some while we were there. When we were driving in Santorini there was sand/dirt that would fly into our eyes so the sunglasses helped block that from happening!

What I was so happy that I packed was JEANS! I randomly packed a pair not thinking that I would wear them and I actually wore jeans almost everyday at some point. Mostly to dinner because it was chilly on the islands at night (like I have mentioned 5 times now lol) I was so thankful to have them!

Is there anything that you always have to bring on vacations?! I would love to know!! Let me know in the comments!

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Santorini Travel Guide

SANTORINI TRAVEL GUIDE

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GETTING THERE

We took another ferry from Direct Ferries to get from Mykonos to Santorini. This time instead of taking the slower boat we took the fast boat for a little bit more money. This wasn’t planned but looking back we were happy to have a shorter boat trip. It was about 2 hours to get to Santorini. Prior to the trip we had no idea how we were going to get from the boat to the hotel but once we arrived to the island, everyone and their mom wanted to take us. AKA it was easy to figure out. We just sort of shuffled off the boat and into a bus line(there were probably 50 companies wanting to take us). We basically decided we just needed to pick one because they were all really the same price. We paid $45 to get us both dropped off at our hotel. We just told them the hotel name and they knew where to go! Easy, just how I like it! I put a lot of tips for Direct Ferries in this post here!

WHERE WE STAYED

We stayed at Aeolos Studios and Suites, it was so perfect! The staff was honestly incredible and so willing to help us. They called and made reservations for us, they brought us breakfast to our room every morning, brought us treats and drinks every night. We seriously came home to something cute every night! They were so happy that we were there and ready to help us at the drop of a hat. The only downside was that our jetted tub that was out on our patio wasn’t heated at all, so it was chilly for a May vacation! Also, a tip for arriving, it’s a little difficult to find. We had to go down the steps to find the reception, but once we found it, they came up and got our luggage for us, so we didn’t have to take it down any steps.

ISLAND VIBE

I think Santorini had just as many people on it as Mykonos but it was much more spread out. Oia was very crowded in the evenings! The vibe of the island was MUCH calmer though, we really enjoyed the slowness that the island had. But when I say that I don’t mean service was slow or anything, just slower paced than Mykonos and definitely slower than Athens. We loved it and it was absolutely gorgeous. Basically, lots of food, wine, relaxing and laughing! The best kind of trip!

WHERE WE ATE

Avocado - lunch here, watch out, you will start and end your meal with a shot of tequila haha lunch here was so yummy though! I got the chicken caesar salad and a side of French fries lol and Dustin got the Seafood pasta! Both were delish!

Vanilla - we ate here two times! The pizza was to die for, the views were breathtaking, and they kept the wine coming! When it’s good, it’s good.. ya know?! haha we ate on the rooftop and it was just perfect! It was chilly from the wind, but they gave us blankets to keep warm!

Da Vinci - again, I ate all the pizza that was in Greece.. if you go there and aren’t able to eat pizza it’s because I ate it all. We had lunch here and it was very good! Dustin got the Risotto Agli Scampi. When we were eating here a couple was trying to get their ATV to start and they just couldn’t figure out how to get it to move forward.. We felt horrible and Dustin was going to go help but then they started arguing so we didn’t. It was sooo awkward but so funny to watch.. haha are we horrible?!

Buddha Bar Beach Santorini - Another restaurant with STUNNING views! Absolutely gorgeous views of the caldera. We sat outside at this restaurant as well. They had fun drinks and even better appetizers! We recommend the calamari!

Skiza Cafe - We stopped in here one night when we were in Oia, the sun had just set we were so freaking hungry lol we sat on the roof and ate pizza.. I literally ate pizza every day in Greece, no I don’t see the problem. haha

GETTING AROUND

When we were in Santorini we rented an ATV to get around, this was a bit pricier than the moped in Mykonos but definitely worth it! Plus, we could go faster on the ATV, which was good for going from one side of the island to the other! It cost us about $70 for two days, but they let us park it there whenever we needed. It was perfect, we parked there and walked like two minutes to our hotel room!

SITES TO SEE/THINGS TO DO

Kissing Fish - WHAT AN EXPERIENCE haha I had done a fish spa prior to Greece but Dustin hadn’t. It was hilarious! Yes, you will be nervous, yes it will tickle, yes you will laugh until you cry. Hands down you need to add this to the list of activities!! It was also a beautiful facility and the staff were so nice! Update: unfortunately, when I was updating links in 2022, I found out this place has closed.

Santo Winery- It was beautiful here! We ended up bringing a couple of bottles home from this winery! The staff was so knowledgable of the wines and really helped us figure out what to order based on what we liked! We sat there for at least three hours drinking all the wine, eating all the cheese and looking at the breathtaking views of the caldera!

Perissa Beach - This was a more publicized beach, there were more people and tons of restaurants and bars. We only spent about an hour here. It looked like you could rent jet skis here as well, lots to do on this beach!

Akrotiri Lighthouse- This was a fun unplanned half day trip! It was the cutest lighthouse called the Akrotiri lighthouse. It was first built in 1892!🤓 This wasn't even something we planned on doing, we just sort of stumbled upon it on our search for lunch, but we ended up spending so much time here(disregarding our hungry stomachs) lol 

Vlichada Beach - We got stuck at this beach.. literally our ATV broke down here(the company was so awesome, they came and brought us a new AVT). BUT if we were going to break down anywhere I would prefer it to be on this gorgeous beach! It had a cute little restaurant here too but we didn’t stop because we were preoccupied with getting off the beach.. lol we definitely recommend visiting this one! It was also fun because we found so so many clay tiles (we think from old buildings) that had washed up on the beach. This is also the beach where the dock was for Caldera Yachting day trip!

Caldera Yachting - this was one of our favorite days of the entire 11 day Greece vacation. It was so relaxing and beautiful. We went snorkeling, and swimming in multiple spots. Plus, they would get you beer or wine, just ask and it’s yours! Also, there was a chef on board who made the most incredible assortment of foods for lunch. It was seriously so much more amazing than you could have ever imagined having food prepared on a boat. Plus you could smell the delicious food the whole time you were swimming! It was also so much fun to get to know the people that were on the boat with us, like where they were from, how their vacation was going and things like that. We love meeting new people! You can get 15% off your tour by using the code caldera2019 when you pre-book your cruise! We would definitely recommend the day trip just because its warm enough to swim and you can dry off in the sun! I think if we would have taken the sunset trip it would have been very cold, especially in May. While it would have been romantic, I think we would have been over it after the sun went down.. ha just being honest!

I hope you guys enjoy this Santorini Travel Guide and you find it useful for planing your own trips! Be sure to check out the posts from Athens and Mykonos as well! As always, let me know what you think and if you have any questions at all!

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Mykonos Travel Guide

MYKONOS TRAVEL GUIDE

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GETTING THERE

We took a boat with Direct Ferries and then once we arrived on the island, our hotel had a car waiting for us. We just had to call the day before to let them know when we would be arriving. And there were actually more people on the boat with us that were going to our hotel! I put a lot of tips for Direct ferries in this post here!

WHERE WE STAYED

We booked all three of our hotels through hotels.com, we usually use hotels.com if we are not staying at the same hotel for the whole trip and I think that always gives us the best deals! If we were to stay at the same hotel, we would buy a flight/hotel combo through Expedia! We stayed at Hotel Poseidon and we LOVED IT! It was honestly my favorite hotel of the three in Greece.. with Santorini being a CLOSE second. This hotel had jaw dropping views of the windmills and the ocean! We also loved their hotel bar and pool area. They had great seating and you could order lunch and/or drinks at the pool bar, too! The room we stayed in was gorgeous and we loved the balcony that we had, perfect for morning coffee and the sunrise. They had a HUGE buffet for breakfast! Literally anything you could think of, it was there. Seriously, they had things like eggs, sausages, potatoes, all the fruit in the world, oatmeal, yogurt..mmm…greek yogurt… The staff was so nice and eager to help us with anything that we needed. One of the days that we were there we got caught in the pouring rain and stopped in the front office and the receptionist was like “oh no, you are soaking wet! Let me get you a couple of towels”! We didn’t even need to ask!

ISLAND VIBE

We loved the vibe on Mykonos, before we got there we had heard things like it’s such a party island and that it’s crowded and loud. We aren’t big partiers so we were a little worried about it. Thankfully we didn’t experience anything like that! Not sure if that’s because the island isn’t that way or just because it was May when we were there. Mykonos in my mind was exactly what I had pictured Santorini to be, which was odd. But we loved the beaches, the town and the little shops. Everyone was so friendly, we loved talking to the shop owners to learn a little about them! One thing that happened to us a few times while we were in town was that we kept feeling like we were somewhere we shouldn’t be. Really, you can walk anywhere! I think we kept feeling like that because the paths would get narrower and narrower the more we would get in to houses rather than shops. But these narrow passes are where we got our best pictures. Don’t be afraid to explore and get lost!

WHERE WE ATE

Sea Satin Market - MEH. It looks like it’s going to be a really great restaurant but its WAY overpriced, and the service was sub-par. We planned on staying for dinner but only ended up getting a couple of appetizers. Yes, they have a great view, but the view can be seen from outside the restaurant for free.

Nice N Easy - We had lunch here one day and it was great! It had a really nice view of the ocean and we ate outside. This was one of those restaurants where they had someone standing outside and they sort of just pull you in and persuade you to eat at the restaurant. You can read more about that here!

Sushi Med Mykonos - you guys…they put canned tuna in our sushi roll.. We totally had to choke the roll down because the waitress was so nice. We felt bad leaving having eaten almost nothing, but we knew the island was full of good food and we weren’t going to waste a dinner there!

Casa di Giorgio - We got the 4-cheese pizza with white sauce and OH MAN was it good, LIFE CHANGING. We also had many a glasses of Sangria and I think it was the best I have ever had. I’m pretty much sangria connoisseur and it was SO good.

D’Angelo Restaurante - So nice you have to say it twice… kidding, but we did eat there twice. It was that good! The Formaggi pizza.. bomb! The spinach ravioli was also amazing. Just watch out for the lemonchello they serve you at the end… haha it is definitely an acquired taste that neither of us ..acquired

Porto Ornos Greek Cucine - This place was on the beach that we went to one day.. I will tell you more later! But the food was excellent. We sat outside and it was delicous!

Trio Bambini- We got ice cream here one day and it was very good! We walked by it so often and finally went in on our last day there! They had a cute outdoor seating area and cute decor and it sucked us in!

GETTING AROUND

We rented a moped while we were on the island for two of the three days and it cost 40 euros for two days. The name of the place was Mihalis - Rent a bike, it was perfect because it was up the road, maybe a 3 minute walk from our hotel! The guy that owned it was very straight forward. It was a fast process and took cash. We had to leave our ID there until we took the moped back. We preferred a moped because the streets were so narrow! He told us where to get gas and not to take it into town. Quick and painless!

SITES TO SEE

Windmills of Kato Mili - We could actually see this from our hotel which was super cool!

Cape Mykonos- This is a hotel, but the beach attached to it was great (which has no name, blahhh)! It was right up the road from our hotel in the opposite direction from the town. It was quiet and there were really only a couple of other people on the beach!

Ornos Beach- This is a beach that we took the afternoon to go to, it was like a 10-15 minute ride on the moped. Nice sand and lots of restaurants around there to eat at, this is when we ate at Porto Ornos Greek Cucine. This beach was a bit more crowded though!

We spent so much time walking through all of the shops in the little town! They had everything from like mom and pop shops to Louis Vuitton! You could spend days here.. we did! Not to mention the million pops of bright colors from the flowers that were everywhere! It was gorgeous!

TIPS

-During the morning, it can get really crowded because of the people getting off of cruise ships, it was crowded from like 9:00am to 1:00pm.

-The locals would drive their mopeds around in the little streets, so watch out for that! Otherwise you might find yourself being honked at lol

Every time we talk about our entire Greece trip I always say, “I seriously loved Mykonos so much!” Don’t get me wrong, I loved Athens and Santorini too, but something about Mykonos just makes me so so excited! I hope this helps you guys when you are planning your trips to Greece! Please comment or email me if you have any other questions, I love hearing from you!

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Athens Travel Guide

ATHENS TRAVEL GUIDE

Our first big trip together was Greece, we prepared for this trip for MONTHS.. not exaggerating.. Athens was our first stop. It was also the stop that we had the most sights to see in such a short amount of time. Once we got there we realized how much closer everything was than we had originally anticipated! There was so much to see! After Athens we went to Mykonos and then onto Santorini.. both posts to come!

WHERE WE STAYED

We chose to spend a little less on our Athens hotel and honestly.. we regretted it. If you guys are planning to visit Athens, I would say find a closer option. Don’t get me wrong, it was nice- the inside was very updated and beautiful.. but it was a little further than we would have liked. Plus there was a KILLER view on the rooftop where they also had a bar and seating. In hindsight, we would have stayed on the other side of the the Acropolis. We stayed at the Athens Center Square Hotel. It was about a 15 minute walk to the Parthenon and like 8 minutes to the train station where all of the shops and restaurants were.

GETTING TO THE HOTEL

When we arrived to the Athens airport, we didn’t exactly have a plan for how we were going to get to the hotel.. but it was easy to navigate around the airport! First, we exchanged some money just to have on hand, we needed it right away with the Taxi that we ended up taking. It was 38 euros to get to the center of Athens. TIP: Make sure you know the address and have a screen shot of where the hotel is on the map. It also wouldn’t hurt to have printed Google Maps instructions, maybe we just had a bad taxi driver but it was touch and go for awhile on if we were going to get to our hotel… haha. The train will take you to and from the airport as well, but we weren’t sure how that would work for us. If we were to go again we would use the train because it was very easy to use.

SITES TO SEE

We were there for two nights (one and a half full days) and that was absolutely plenty of time. We really only needed one full day to see everything that we wanted to! We bought a pass at the entrance to Ancient Agora that got us into all of the attractions except for Panathenain Stadium. It was 30 euros each and well worth it!

1. Ancient Agora - it took us about 3 hours to walk through and be able to take it all in. I think our jaws were on the floor the whole time we were in Athens, really… haha it had so many great buildings such as the Temple of Aries(which was nothing but markers of where it was), Temple of Apollo Patroos, and the Church of The Holy Apostles. We also met a tortoise friend.. so cute, melted my heart.

2. Stoa of Attalos - this was inside of the Ancient Agora and was so interesting to look at all of the artifacts that had been found in Ancient Agora. It had tons of things like beautiful sculptures, pottery, coins, statues, weapons and a mini replica of what Acropolis hill used to look like.

3. Library of Hadrian - We didn’t go in this while we were there but walked around it. In hindsight, I’m not sure that you could go in it. It did make for cool pictures though!

4. The Acropolis - This was something that we woke up really early to go do and we are so glad that we did. We were alone with very few people for two hours of the five that it took us to see everything. I would highly recommend getting there as soon as it opens to be able to take photos without people in the background. There are more than what I am listing but these are the highlights!

   • Herodes Theater - We spent so much time looking at this, we were just baffled at the narrow steps, the view, the architecture. Amazing!

   • Temple of Athena Nike - We walked through this to get to the Parthenon. There were no railings and slippery steps but it was just so amazing to see. Lots of photo ops!

   • Parthenon - basically the entire reason we wanted to go up the hill but shortly found out there was so much more to it. Dustin said it fulfilled every one of his childhood dreams of Greece. Absolutely breathtaking!

   • Erechtheum/Pandroseion - This building had 6 ladies carved as pillars holding the building up, and we joked about them being the ladies from Hercules.. They aren’t but it definitely looks like it!

   • Dionysos Theatre - Once we walked back down the hill on the other side, there was another theater to see. I believe it was the older of the two.

5. Temple of Olympian(Zeus) - This was a trek to get to from the Parthenon but well worth the walk. It was interesting because some of the extremely tall pillars had fallen over and were left there. Looking at these you could see all the detail that went into making them so they would all fit together! It was sort of sad at how little of it was still there.

6. Panathenain Stadium - This was one of my favorite things to see. It had a track to run around, everything was made of stone and just so cool to see. We spent a lot of time here taking pictures, like seriously it was so fun here!

7. National Gardens - On the way back to the hotel we walked through the National Gardens and this was interesting to see in the middle of all of the buildings. There were some streams and animals in the gardens as well. When we were walking back we were able to walk past the Hellenic Parliament building.

PHOTO OPP: Monastiraki Square both during the day and at night, or in our case at 5:30 am when we were walking to the train! It was great in the morning because there weren’t people in the shot, it was just Dustin and I!

WHERE WE ATE

We didn’t eat out very much in Athens, we were jet lagged and our schedules were so off so our meal times were really off.

Maiandros Restaurant.. We ate here for dinner on our first night. This place was delicious, it had a family-run feeling and they were the nicest people! We also ate on the roof, such a great view of the Parthenon! FYI: Most of the restaurants had the menu in both English and Greek.

DaVinci for gelato.. so good. Need I say more?! We tried the strawberry and the cookies and cream, no complaints here!

The Greco’s Project.. we ate so much food here haha we got the fried mini zucchini (MUST HAVE), the chicken meat on a spit with potato chips/french fries and then Dustin got the chicken souvlaki. Even when we were ordering the waiter was like that is plenty. The waiters were extremely helpful and even looked out for you. I had my phone sitting out on the corner of the table and he pointed to it and said “I would recommend you put that in a safer place.” Making sure we didn’t get anything stolen by a pick pocket. They also brought us a mini chocolate cake and then a sort of grittier(for lack of a better word) coffee cake(SO GOOD). We loved that most restaurants brought you a sample of dessert, it was a fun surprise to see what you would get at the end of your meal.

GETTING TO THE FERRY

We walked about 5 blocks from our hotel to the train station that took us all the way to the ferry. We liked the train, it was clean and quick(especially at 5:30am). We exited the train at Piraeus and walked out of the station. Almost every single person that was on the train with us was going to get on the Ferry. Before we could get on we needed to stop at the ticket booth to get our tickets because all we had were confirmation numbers in our email to pick them up. This took about 15 minutes because most people needed to do the same, so factor that in time-wise! We used Direct Ferries, there were huge signs for it, we saw them as soon as we walked out of the station. TIP: When you are booking your Ferry tickets, make sure that you triple check the date that you are selecting, even though you might have originally chosen a certain date, they will add dates around it at different prices. The people at the ticket booth told us which dock our ferry was at. We had no problems with it at all and it was fairly seamless. For the first ferry to Mykonos we opted for the longer ride which was cheaper and it was about 4 hours long. There was another option that cost more that was only about 2 hours long. We brought cards and that in addition to watching the ocean, the time flew by! I would recommend if you take the longer ride you can save even more by getting the standard ride ticket instead of assigned seats. We ended up leaving our seats and going topside to watch islands go by and get some sea air!

Athens has been a place I have wanted to go for so so long. Dustin as well, he took a lot of Greek Myology classes in college and it had been on his list ever since. Have you guys been to Athens? What was your favorite part?

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8 Things We Learned While Traveling in Greece

8 THINGS WE LEARNED WHILE TRAVELING IN GREECE

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Here are our 8 tips that we learned from traveling in Greece!

1. Resturants aren't accustomed to bringing you the check right away, so you will need to ask for it. We found this to be nice because it taught us to slow down and enjoy our time at each place. I think this made meals more like small experiences, and we made sure to make the best of them.

2. Be sure to bring shoes that have traction with you to Greece. Pro tip: put hot glue on the bottoms of your sandals(the glue will peel off when you get home)! The steps on the cliff side and around the towns are slippery in Mkyonos and Santorini, especially Oia where the walk way is marble! Especially in the picture to the left, this was the kind of the that was so slippery.

3. In Athens, there are people who will walk up to you and compliment you and then give you something for free and say it’s free and then try to convince you into giving them money. Also if they say they have change for you, they probably don't. They sell things like flowers and homemade bracelets. We only saw them in the square next to the metro station.

4. In Mykonos and Santorini we recommend renting either an ATV or a moped. We wouldn't have been able to see half of the things we did had we not got these. BUT, BE CAREFUL when you are driving! Also, moped in Mykonos and ATV in Santorini, the moped was 30 euros for two days and the ATV was 60 euros for two days!

5. Almost every restaurant will have a staff member standing at the entrance and their job is to entice you to come in and it usually works, even if you had plans elsewhere! If you aren't feelin' what they have just repeatedly say thank you and move on. 

6. Even though everything is beautiful at night, make sure you are watching where you are walking in addition to looking at those amazing views (I can’t even tell you how many times my husband almost fell down steps because he was looking at the ocean) lol 

7. In Athens, make sure you never put anything on the table including things like your phone, wallet, keys.. there were some people who were walking around looking specifically for those kinds of things to steal/take. Luckily the workers at the restaurants are looking out for you. Moral of the story, keep your belongings close! 

8. Bring jeans and a cardigan because it will be cold at nights(even in mid-May). There wasn’t one restaurant that didn’t offer us blankets though, so don’t let the wind steer you away from sitting on the rooftop! 

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