Everything you need to know about Santorini Greece

December 30, 2022

Everything you need to know about Santorini Greece

Print available for purchase – copyright Plan to Wander LLC

The most visited island in Greece

Blue domed churches over the Mediterranean sea and luxury hotels await you in Santorini. Santorini is a must visit island for your first trip to Greece. Sunset boat rides, delicious seafood, and beautiful luxury stores are most of what to expect. Santorini is as magical as it looks, but sometimes people do not expect some of the chaos. I definitely have some tips to share to help make your trip more relaxed.

Where to stay

Santorini has different towns on the island and they are different in terms of pricing. The most sought out and popular town to stay in is Oia. Oia is the most congested part of the island to stay in because of the sunset views and the photogenic blue domed churches. An affordable cave room option in Oia can be found with Kaleidoscope Santorini Cave Hotel. I enjoyed my stay here, Costas was an excellent host. I have never seen anyone work harder! Costas will also get you connections with a creperie for breakfast called Vitrin. More on this later!

Another popular town near Oia with views of the caldera is Imerovigli. You can expect similar atmosphere to Oia but a smaller town and quieter in comparison. One luxury accommodation that should be on your bucket list, and is on my own, is Cavo Tagoo Santorini. This hotel looks absolutely beautiful with amazing sunset views over the caldera.

Thira is another main town with many restaurants and shops and closest to the ferry port. In Thira you can find more budget friendly accommodations but also many luxury options as well. I have stayed at Costa Marina Villas, this is a great place to stay near the bus station, it is quiet but also walking distance to the main square.

Oia Santorini — Oia at night- copyright Plan to Wander LLC

Activities

Santorini has many fun or relaxing activities to make your vacation memorable. Santorini isn’t a big island, but still requires bus or car to get around the island to visit different attractions. Instead of bus or car though, I would recommend renting an ATV for a day or two to help explore the island! There are many different ATV rental places available on the island. Please be careful and aware of your surroundings when using the ATV, accidents do happen. I also recommend renting the ATV in Thira as you are more centrally located and can get to southern and eastern parts of the island easily from there.

Now you have your ATV rental, where should you go now? Along the main road from Thira going south you will find some wineries and the Santorini Brewing Company! The wineries and brewery are a great stop for a couple of drinks on the way to the beach. The brewery has fun named beers that make it hard to pass on buying merchandise.

After a couple of drinks (within reason of course!), it is time to drive down to Kamari to visit the black sand/rocky beaches! Kamari is a coastal village on the southeast side of the island. This is really the only place I recommend to drive to for swimming in Santorini. You can pay for some chairs from one of the restaurant/cafes to enjoy relaxing. Swim out to some rocks to jump off of, however beware of where you step because of sea urchins!

Now if ATV rides and black rocky beaches aren’t your thing, a luxury experience I recommend to do regardless is taking a boat ride around the island which ends with an epic sunset. Santorini has many companies available for this experience, but I recommend taking Sunset Oia. The crew is professional with great story telling and excellent food to eat. To have a more intimate experience but not spending insane money, the platinum cruise is a great deal because they have a max limit of 14 people. The cruise will take you to some amazing swim spots so you will have the opportunity to swim more in the Mediterranean.

Helpful tips

I want to share some insight into Santorini in case it is your first visit and you haven’t read many blogs with this information. Santorini is known for its amazing sunsets over the caldera and maybe you already know getting a good spot can be chaos. If you are wanting to be in the popular spot of the Castle ruins to watch (because it is a prime spot), expect to get there 2-3 hours before to claim your spot. It is a mad-house! But, what if I tell you a little inside scoop? If you go to Vitrin for breakfast one early morning in Oia, ask your waiter/waitress if you can pay to reserve a table for sunset that night.

I know it sounds silly to pay to have a sunset spot, but if it is important to you, do it! You will get to sit back and watch people freaking out where to watch the sunset from and you will be enjoying drinks and some appetizers. Alternatively, you can arrive at Vitrin early to claim a table as well and wait it out for a couple of hours. Funny story, since we reserved a table, they had to kick someone out from that table. Oops.

The next thing to combat in Santorini is being able to take photos of yourself, the scenery, etc. Oia is a rather difficult place to get nice pictures of yourself because of the crowds. All of the famous instagram spots have lines first thing in the morning, just as a heads up. You will not be the only one out there to take a photo. If you wish to have amazing photos, you can hire a photographer but it will be a little costly. My tip for this, is visit when Santorini first opens to travelers for the season to beat crowds. Sometime in May or October will have less people, but probably not by a landslide.

Another piece of important information I want to impart on you, is not to expect to easily drive up to your hotel in Oia. You see by the photos how everything is on top of each other. There is no parking for hotels with views of the caldera. This means you will be lugging your luggage threw tight alley ways and stairs. Keep this piece of information in mind and if you can travel a little on the lighter side, you will thank me later.

How long to visit

You may be wondering how long I recommend for a visit to Santorini. It all depends on what you want to experience and how you like to vacation. If you only wish to visit Santorini, 5 days is plenty of time to experience the island. If you are going to island hop, which I highly recommend, you can do 3 days in Santorini and still have plenty of time to experience it all. I can provide a rough itinerary for three days, let me know!

Hidden Gem

Lastly, I want to share a little hidden gem with you if you are up to the adventure. Near Vitrin and the Oia Castle, there are many steps that lead you down to Amoudi Bay. At the bottom of the steps there are a couple of different seafood restaurants to eat at, check one of them out! You can walk past all of the restaurants along the rocks and around a bend until you come to a little swim spot. There are only rocks to lay on and leave your stuff, so just be aware of this.

You are able to swim out to a rock that has a platform you can jump off of. Takes a little muscle to pull yourself up it, but definitely doable. You will see locals coming here to flip off of the rock platform. Check out the spot from a few of my photos below. As another note, you will pass this rock if you go out for the sunset cruise ending in Amoudi.