Welcome to my Santorini guide for first timer’s! This guide is about my experience and how it might help you to navigate Santorini for the first time. This is in no way a complete guide, just personal advice I love to share!

Anteliz Suites in Fira

View from the very top of Fira

Guide to Getting there

First off getting to Greece from the USA is no easy task but totally worth it! Many airports have a direct flight to Athens which I highly recommend. We had to take a plane to London, then switch to Athens then take another plane from Athens into Santorini. Phew it was exhausting! We never took the ferry, I heard really negative stories from couples we met in Greece about taking the ferry. It can take sometimes hours. I recommend flying into Santorini from Athens. It is a smaller plane but it is nice and quick plus you get gorgeous views from the top! You also can avoid having to go all the way up the many many stairs from the port. Just get a cab from the airport and they can drop you off near your hotel. When I say near, it means you might have to carry your suitcases to your hotel yourself. We has international service so we actually were able to call our hotel and the staff came out help us with our luggage.

FIRA

Our first stop was beautiful Fira. I definitely think Fira is a great starting off point to introduce you to Santorini. It is mainly where a lot of cruise ships dock so there are a good amount of tourists. We stayed basically at the very top of Fira at the Anteliz Suites. I am happy we stayed at the top because we were mostly walking downhill and the views were great, but then when we had to go home it was a trek!

We went to Santorini in mid April so it was actually pretty chilly sometimes.It was not really warm enough for the pool and the pools are not heated and are freezing ( at least the ones we had were not) That being said, it was great walking around weather. Even when the temperature did rise and the sun came out it sometimes became way too hot to walk around. Make sure to drink a ton of water! You will be walking so much and up many steps, the wine is also dry too which makes you thirsty.

One of my favorite things in Greece is breakfast at the hotel. I know that some hotels give you a floating breakfast in a pool, but it was too cold for that so we just got breakfast on our deck. The signature morning drink is a frappe which is a foamy delicious coffee. I also LOVE Greek scrambled eggs. I loved them so much I tried to make them at home but it is just not the same.

The best things to do in Greece are really to walk around, take in the sites, relax, eat and drink! All of the food in Fira is going to be delicious but I recommend going to the lesser known restaurants on the side streets or hidden upstairs. I also love popping into the shops, but only the good ones! I found a really gourmet nice olive oil shop on a side street. I was able to take that back with me (but sadly not the honey)

We tried to go down to the water but there were wayyyy to many stairs. You could take a donkey up or down, but we definitely chose not to (they are smelly)

Imerovigli and FiroStefani

These two villages are a somewhat short walk from Fira, they were closer to our hotel but might be longer if you are further down. I highly recommend checking out these villages as I thought they were incredibly beautiful and also way less touristy. They also had incredible restaurants.

Oia

Oia is probably the most famous part of Santorini and I definitely recommend staying a few nights here, don’t just visit for the day. I loved Oia and honestly liked it a lot better than Fira. It is really more picturesque and beautiful. Fira was cloudy the majority of the time we were there and Oia was sunny. That might have just been the forecast but either way it was nice to finally see some sun. We stayed at the incredible Mystique resort. The resort was perfect and of course had an amazing infinity pool overlooking the sea. It was still way too cold to swim but we tried. The only drawback was that it was about a 20 minute walk from the main part of town. Our room was in a cave and we got the best sleep! We did a fantastic private wine tasting as well in their wine cave. I would still very much stay here again.

We would usually wait until before sunset to walk into town because it was pretty warm, plus we had to see the famous cliffside sunset in Oia. To get to the famous cliffside spot, just follow all the tourists walking and you will find yourself at the Oia Byzantine Castle ruins. I recommend either getting there VERY early to secure a spot on the castle, or what we did which I think is better, is to just go a little bit after sunset when everyone is walking back. The sunset will still be going but most people would have “gotten the shot” and left. We had so much room to enjoy the view. Don’t forget to stop along the way to the castle for other gorgeous views. The view is also beautiful in the daytime or the early morning when there are no tourists. I will also say that maybe because we went in April, I did not find there to be that many tourists, at least it didn’t take away from my enjoyment.