March 6

The weather was better this morning – no shrieking wind or rain, but it was still cloudy. Allie and I decided to make the most of what we had, and we went on with our plans to visit Oia and see the rest of the island. Mary, who has been ill since Istanbul, decided not to join us on our outing, but her friend Elizabeth came. We decided to rent a car as it would be faster and cheaper, but when we came to the Rent a Moto shop, the ATVs were calling to us – that and we were 1 year too young to rent a car. Allie and I each got a 10 minute lesson before setting out. Elizabeth just wanted to be a passenger.
I’m actually pretty good at driving an ATV. It is very similar to a jet-ski, which I have a little bit of experience with. My ATV did have some quirks though, but that just made the whole experience better. The model I rode was a bit older than Allie, so it didn’t have the ability to reverse. The man warned me to remember that when I parked, but of course there weren’t many opportunities for me to make a wide turn before parking. My solution ended up being I would park wherever I wanted and then just grab the ATV by the rear bars and pull it far enough backwards so I could clear a forwards turn. Allie and Elizabeth laughed, but I thought I was being very practical. And it was pretty funny.
We ventured around the island going anywhere we pleased. Allie offered up the lead to me, which I tried not to seem too eager to accept. I love being in the lead. We went to Oia first and found the cute little homes accessed by steep, painted steps. We even passed a man on his donkey, slowly going up the road. We drove down to Amoudi Bay and snapped shots of the fishermen. This bay was used for the movie version of Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, seen (and read) my almost every girl my age. We were having so much fun at this point. Driving those ATVs so exposed to the wind and going on these winding roads that cut through the mountains and overlook whitewashed houses and pastel churches, all trimmed in bright blue, I just felt so free and refreshed. Of course these ATVs don’t really go over 30 kilometers per hour, so were constantly being passed by other cars, but still, it was fun and freeing. We drove around the island, and took back roads to the black sandy beaches. I had forgotten to bring a container in which to put some of this sand, but fortunately (and very much unfortunately), I had plenty of plastic bottles on the beach from which to choose.
By 1:00pm the wind was picking up again, and we were getting a bit chilly. We had told the Rent-a-Moto guys that we would return the vehicles around 2, so we stopped for a coffee at a nearby café. Sufficiently caffeinated and ready to head back to hotel, we returned the ATVs to the shop and walked back to the hotel. Of course the guys at the shop wanted our business, but they seemed very glad to see that we returned intact (both our bodies and the vehicles).
We arranged a ride to the port with Stavros and left the hotel at 2:30 for our 3:30 ferry. The ferry was a little late in arriving, probably because of the wind, but lots of other people we also waiting so we knew that our ride hadn’t been cancelled. We managed to grab a table in the eating area and I got some homework done. The salad that I made last night was a delicious and nutritious meal for the ferry.