I have some good news and some bad news.
We’ll start with some bad news.
BN- You know how I’ve been a blogging fiend these last few
years? Well, apparently there is a cap as to how many pictures your blog can
store and as of now, my blog has reached that limit. So, from hence forth and
forever my blog can have no more pictures added. UNLESS, I either pay to get
more space {not happening} or I figure out a way to transfer old posts to a new
blog so I can continue using this blog cause I like it. I don’t know. Do any of
you people who read this know any solutions to this un-heard of and terrible
situation I’m having?
GN- Greece is beautiful. If I could upload pictures, I’d
post a few to show you. But then you’d probably be really sad that you’re not
here right now.
BN-I’m leaving Greece tomorrow to start my journey back to
the land of America, or more precisely, Utah.
GN- Tomorrow I
get to start my journey back to the land of America, or more precisely, Utah.
{yes, I just copied and pasted that sentence because I was too lazy to type it
again even though telling you this just added even more length that I had to
type.}
BN- Riding the donkey was not exactly what I had imagined it
would be… {**see asterisk story under all of my BN/GN updates**}
GN-I totally went parasailing!!! We went up to a tent set up
on the beach that said “crazy sports” on it because it said on the side
something like “parasailing, waterskiing, tubing, boating, anything your heart
could imagine doing in water” just to see how much it would be to go
parasailing. Well, I told myself I would do it if it was under a certain
amount. And guess what? It was 5 under that amount. But, Beth and I had left
our wallets at the hotel because we wouldn’t need them at the beach and we told
the guy we’d be back and wanted to do it.
Well,
BN- he didn’t believe us. So I pinky promised him {this is a
true story. I really pinky promised the Greek man who probably thought I was
insane} that we’d be back in a little bit. AND
GN- to ensure that we’d be back, he gave us ten dollars off!
So instead of Beth and I paying 70 total to go, he let us pay 60. Probably the
best 30 bucks ever spent.
BN- we had to wait like and hour and a half to go.
GN- I had never been on a speed boat on the ocean before
BN- it was windier than the point of the mountain.
GN-I worked on my modeling hair in the wind.
BN- when they unpacked the parachute thing I thought I was
in serious trouble because all the fabric and strings and clip thingies were in
a mega mess and knotted ant tangled and I had no idea how that thing was going
to work.
GN-the man from Nigeria and the Greek man with his 2 sons
under 10 pulled of a miracle and made the parachute go up.
BN- the Greek man asked us how much we weighed. And when I
told him in pounds, I’m pretty sure he looked at me like I was a fatty mc fat
pants. {kilos are more than double what a pound is for those of you who don’t
know}.
GN- It’s waay
cool how you get up in the air! You sit on the back of the boat, they let go
and in a split second you’re literally flying super high. The wind was blowing
really hard, and it was a bit terrifying at a few points, but can you imagine
the view I got of one of the most beautiful places on Earth?? The guy driving the boat made us go
sooo high. We were literally directly over the boat and then he swooped us down
so low a few times that we dipped our feet in the ocean. Let me clarify- a ma
zing.
BN- I’m not so graceful at the landing part of
parasailing….. I may or may not have slid into the boat on my rear end nearly
knocking the poor Nigerian man down in the process, trying to wipe a big splash
of salt water off of my face, while the Greek man was yelling “quickly madam,
quickly madam! Madam madam!”. I’m pretty sure he meant, “get off of your rear
so you don’t get caught and drown in the parachute.
GN-I’m alive.
BN- the pictures the 10 year old boy took of us were
fantastic. So fantastic that you can’t even tell if it’s Beth or me you’re
looking at. Again, if blogger didn’t hate my guts right now, I’d post a really
fantastic picture of me parasailing. Or like one of my white legs parasailing.
That good. :P
GN- I got to ride a donkey a second time. And this time it
was the donkey ride of my dreams.
{***once again, donkey story will be last. Hang tight. I’m probably half
way done or more by now.***}
GN- I had lobster for 6.50. SIX FIFTY!! Can you believe
that?? I couldn’t. that’s why I got it. To prove that in fact it wasn’t a lie.
And it wasn’t. :D
GN- I ate squid. Well, a bite of squid. I didn’t really feel
like ordering a whole thing of it so I just ate a bite of steeve’s. Kinda
weird. But I did it.
GN- I hiked to the very top of the volcano.
BN- when the lady said the tour included “seeing” the volcano,
I thought she meant seeing it from the ship. No no. she meant hike the whole
darn things. You may be thinking “why is this bad?” Well, I’ll tell you. BAD
because I was in flip flops. I mean, let’s be honest, you go to an island, you
don’t wear hiking shoes. You wear cheap 99 flip flops cause it’s gross to put
socks on when your feet are wet and salty.
GN- I hiked that whole volcano like a boss in those cheap
purple flip flops. {thank you Lindy and Steeve for teaching me that phrase}
BN- my feet were super hot the whole time and I found out
why. The tour guide dug a 20 cm deep hole {he told us it was 20 cms’. Whatever
that means} and the earth started to steam. And he picked up a rock down there
and let us touch it and it was hot! He said it was so hot that “you could boil
eggs down there” {out of everything you could say you could boil he chose eggs.
He should have said something more fun than boiled eggs. I mean, boiled eggs
aren’t even really that good when comparing it to say boiled chicken, or boiled
potatoes, right?} Regardless, you can boil stuff 20 cm below the ground on that
volcano. Which explains why my flip flops look semi- melted and my feet were
burning.
GN- I hiked that whole volcano like a boss.
GN- the boat we took around the little islands looked just
like a pirate ship. I wanted to war an eye patch, call a parrot to come sit on
my shoulder and say “argggh mateys!” but I didn’t. instead i….
GN- jumped off of the boat in my little 1 shoulder swim suit
into the hot springs by the volcano that…
BN-dyed my skin orange for a little bit and made me look
like I had a beard. It’d be a good look on me I think.
GN- I jumped off the boat into the ocean!!
BN-there was a male on the boat that drove everyone insane.
He is yet another American that gives us American’s a bad name to the world.
GN- Lindy got the best picture of him ever. {I’d post it,
but yet again, I cannot because I have no room for pictures. :’( }
GN- pita wraps {known to Greece as soulvaki has French fries
in it. Like IN the wrap. It’s possibly the greatest invention known to
mankind.}
GN- I tried musaka {you know, like in My Big Fat Greek
Wedding when the main character brings her Tupperware of leftovers to school
for lunch as a child and all the blonde girls eating wonder brand sandwiches
asks what it is and she says, “musaka” and they laugh and say “moose ca ca?”
that’d be it.} It’s sweet. Like not quite a dessert, but not salty. And it has
eggplant. And I’m a big fan of eggplant. {That’s not a joke. That is in all
seriousness. mmm}
GN- I also ate this thing called Gemisa {I probably chose
this because it looked like my darling niece, Gemma’s name.} and it was stuffed
bell pepper and a stuffed huge tomato with rice, and pine nuts, and seasonings,
and raisins. And surprisingly, it was tasty.
GN- I’ve discovered this thing called “fanta lemonade.” Not
a good thing.
GN- the bakery across the street from where we’re staying
has some really good baklava. That piece was huge too! And rich. I had to save
half for breakfast.
GN- we rented 4 wheelers for 3 days while we were there to
get around.
BN- Beth and I’s was having a trial. It would only go an
average of 15 up a hill [kph, not mph} when the guy told us to go at 50 as to
not get ran over. It took forever to get anywhere, but alas, it was faster than
walking and cheaper than getting a taxi or bus.
GN- I bought myself an apron with a donkey on it with bright
pink lipstick that’s cooking and it says “santorini donkey cooking on it” and
it’s cute.
GN- I bought Gemma a little {nearly matching my apron} bib
with a donkey on it. Don’t tell her though, it’s a surprise.
BN- I sliced my leg on a beach chair on the beach under a
cute cabana. And I didn’t even have any band aids because I gave them to the
poor and helpless –aka {mainly steeve because he seriously has had some trials
here. I’m going to take a break from my GN BN and tell you about just the ones
involving his left foot}
First steeve crisis- make a story short, he fell off a bed
and tour a huge chunk of flesh off the bottom of his foot that looked nasty. So I gave him
Band-Aids as to not have to see this nasty wound.
Second steeve foot crisis- His shoes gave him some pretty
incredibly bloody blisters. So, I gave him some more Band-Aids.
And just when you think his poor left foot was done being
injured so he could stop limping and walk normally again….
Third Steeve left foot crisis- a super market cooler door
literally fell on top of his big toe. Like he opened the door to get a drink {I
think} and the door fell off of the cooler and onto his toe. I wasn’t there to
witness this but I laughed my face off when he recounted the story to me. I
know it’s not funny, but how he described it and just the series of events that
happened after and before this was just so ironic that I laughed so hard my abs
hurt! So here’s how he described what happened after- a guy that works there
saw that the door was on the floor and said to steeve something like, “oh,
don’t worry about, it happens all the time”. You’d think that if the door to
this cooler thing fell off all the time, they’d have fixed it. How many people
have to leave that store, limping and bloody for them to fix it? His toe looks
nasty. Like it’s really blue and purple and he’s definitely going to have a
fantastic black nail. Anyways, hopefully that ends the bad news streak for
steeve’s left foot.
BN- sunscreen here is the price of an artificial knee.
GN- I used nearly a whole bottle in 3 days.
BN- I still got a little sunburnt.
GN- I’m mostly just really tan now.
BN- sunscreen is nasty. Think about it. You are applying
loads of this greasy white cream stuff that you can feel your pours clogging
and in revenge you know they’re going to send you the gift of pimples.
GN- I found my mom a souvenir. Mom’s are the hardest to shop
for.
BN- there was a cockroach on our toilet.
GN- we flushed it down the toilet.
BN- you can’t throw TP down the toilet….. Kind of grosses me
out to put it in the trash…
GN- I can’t think any more GN/BN.
Wait!!! I can
GN- I only have 30 pages left in the Book of Mormon. Goal of
reading cover to cover in 2 months while in Europe will be a success. :D
Okay, now for the Donkey stories.
Since I was a wee little teenager and watched sisterhood of
the traveling pants for the first time I have wanted to ride a donkey in
Santorini. So the entire time in Europe I’ve {naturally} been really excited to
ride one. So I finally get the
opportunity and it was not at all what I had expected. In fact, it was slightly
terrifying.
We enter the port on our little pirate ship and pay the man
to ride the donkey up the stairs. He literally picks me up, slaps me on this
donkey that was probably cranky because it had a cage muzzle around it’s mouth,
I hold out my camera to the man to ask if he could take a picture, and instead,
he yells something really loud and whips the donkey and the donkey thinks it’s
the Kentucky derby. It is charging up the stairs like there’s no tomorrow and
I’m trying to a- stay on the donkey. B- trying to not let go of my camera. C- trying
to not scrape my legs against the wall while the donkey is trying to win
getting up the hill. D- trying to enjoy my dream of riding a donkey. And e-
feeling bad for the poor donkey for having carry my sorry back side {if I
cussed, I would have used a fitting word there} up these stairs and for his bum
bum to cause it was just whipped!!
So we get to the top and you’d think that I just charged up
the hill because I didn’t breath the whole time and so I was out of breath.
I then try to hand the guy my camera again {because I’d
wanted to ride a donkey for so long that I had to have a picture of it.} and
this time he keeps yelling “madame madam madam madame madame!! Quickly
quickly!” and once again, picks me up, and takes me off the donkey. And the
second I got off, the donkey started charging down the stairs. Sigh. Not at all
what I had imagined.
Poor Beth had a worse experience than I did. The donkey
scraped up her legs and made her toe bleed.
So we came up with a grand plan to go back and pay them more
money if they’d let us go slow, not whip their donkeys, and let us enjoy it.
So we went to a different part of the island and the old man
in charge of this one was really sweet and nice. We told him we’d give him 10
euros instead of 5 if he PROMISED we could go slow, and that I could get my
picture taken on the donkey. He didn’t speak much English but he understood
perfectly because he gave us really nice donkeys {none of his donkeys had cage
muzzles and looked healthier} and didn’t whip them. He helped us up on donkeys
and instead of going up and down the stairs, he took us on a nice walk along
the coast! It was beautiful!! And every once in a while he stopped a random
person and asked if they could take our picture for us. I kept patting my
donkey and whispered what a good donkey he was into his ear, and thanked him
too. It was seriously the best donkey ride anyone has ever gotten in Santorini.
We got down off of our donkeys and then got pictures of us with our donkeys and
with the man who led us on them. He was so sweet, he put his arm around me and
leaned his head on mine. And even though he was old, and partly toothless, he
was an adorable Greek man. {you
know the drill, I’d put some pictures up, but I can’t.}
I’m writing this post on a 4 hour ferry ride from Santorini
to Athens and my stomach is feeling slightly queezy, so I best go.
Ta ta. Next post I’ll probably be back on US soil.
XOXO
