Pokin had booked a photoshoot this morning.  There’s this thing called a flying dress.  With Santorini being pretty windy, it’s a thing to wear these long flowy dresses, hog up the prime spots around town and look stupid in front of the tourists with these dresses as you stick your legs out in funny positions.

I didn’t get the appeal but Pokin thought it’d be fun.  She  got a package for her and my bud, and then another one for Chris and Julia.  She booked makeup and hair as well, meaning all of us had to get up at 7AM in the morning to do hair and makeup in time for a 9:30AM photoshoot.

It’s early.

I sat and listened as the hair and makeup artists got to work.

Tasha is from the Ukraine.  She was displaced during the war and settled here to work.  She works on everything from photoshoots to weddings and is one of the seasonal workers.  She will be back to Athens in November.  The other makeup artist grew up in Santorini, but is pregnant and will be having her baby soon.  She also spends her winters in Athens.  Both of them have been working non-stop 10+ hour days to get as much business as possible before the dead season.

I meant it when I said Santorini is seasonal. The whole island shuts down by November and about 5000 residents remain.

At 9:30, the photographer and the assistant Edward and Irene arrive.  They help Pokin change into her first dress and I am super impressed.  I was very skeptical when they said the dress sizes were XS – L, and L – XXL, but it turns out the fabrics twist and turn very accommodatingly.  So they twisted and turned and adjusted the fabrics and voila, it fit.

We started the photoshoot on the hotel property before moving all around town.  My bud was dressed in a suit and as the day got progressively hotter, I felt bad for him.  But he was a good spot and we moved from spot to spot.

Now that I knew what a flying dress photoshoot looked like, I saw them all around town.  All the girls and their buds looking uncomfortably hot with their entourage. At one point there were so many of these groups we had to wait in line for our spots.  Until now, little did I realize how busy things were.  Luckily some areas were chained off only for photographers, or else we wouldn’t have been able to elbow through crowds.

Two hours later, the shoot was over and it was time to scramble, as we were headed to our next destination.  A boat.

Nicholas decided that the one thing you had to do in Santorini was do a boat cruise.  And it had to be on a catamaran.

So we booked one with food for sunset. The cruise location was pretty far away and required an hour commute (mostly because of the windy roads), so we had to be picked up at 1pm for a 2pm boat time.

What Pokin didn’t tell Chris and Julia is that she had booked a private catamaran cruise.  And so when we pulled up to the dock, Julia wondered – “where is everyone?”

“This is it, the boat is just for us,” my bud responded just as the crew came out to greet us.

There were 3 crew total – the captain, the chef, and an extra person.  We got settled in (shoes off), and off we went.

I have to admit, I wasn’t such a fan of being on a boat, but it was pretty worth it – especially doing it on our on boat.  We got to go at our own pace, to explore all the islands and photograph everything.

We even had food made by a chef. I took note. No cocoa.

We went from red cliff to white cliff to a diving spot, before making our way around towards the volcano.

The whole round trip took 5 hours, which was a lovely leisurely pace.

Pokin took Dramamine and was still recovering so she passed out at one point, but I hung out with my bud on the front of the boat.

When we got to the volcano centre, I noticed a hut and a church – “what’s going on?” I wondered.

“Oh that’s the fisherman who has no wife” came the answer.  Cryptic.

Turns out there was a BBC documentary made about this person.  He wasn’t a fisherman, but rather a lovestruck sailor who had fallen in love with an Italian lady who promised to return and never did, but not from lack of trying.

Turns out she had already been betrothed to someone in the Italian mafia, and when they found out tried to hunt him down, leading him to escape to this island.

He is now around 87 years old, and apparently can still be sighted on the island in just his speedos or no clothes, yelling at the tourists who float by.

Suckers.  I’m glad my priority is just gaming and hanging with my bud.

The volcano was the turning point, so we turned around and headed back to the harbour as the sun set behind us.

A pretty nice day overall.

I like sailing on a private catamaran.