Santorini: the island that got away.

Memories.

My last post was of a picture that was taken on the Greek Island of Mykonos. Last week, boredom hit me as I was on Facebook and I decided to creep through some old photos.

Europe. Oh man.

I really do miss it. (I lived there for a year and have been back twice since then).

I miss London mostly. (Which I will have to blog about that whole chapter another time).

In 2008, my self and six friends went on a little adventure to Europe. Oh the memories.

I can’t even count them on one hand.

Staying at the sketchiest hostel… transitioning from disgusting hostel to Colour Conference at Royal Albert Hall in Kensington.

Sleeping in airports… and in one of them, two of the girls stayed up all night and drew pictures of us.

Eating curry in Brick Lane. Mmmmmmmmmmmm

Eating British chocolate everyday (that really hasn’t changed as I’m eating a galaxy bar as I write this)

Frolicking in a park in Dublin, reading Oscar Wilde quotes on monuments.

Topshop Oxford Street. (Nuff said)

Laying eyes on the original Olympic rings in Athens.

Camden Town.

Eating fries from a fry-fork in an Athens MacDonalds.

Walking down the same streets the Apostle Paul did in Ephesus.  (INSANE…and there were a lot of cats there too?.. I know, weird)

I am a planner. I love planned things. I do love random, crazy, last minute adventures but I guess these are usually planned. So obviously we planned this Europe trip. I was amongst like 4 other type A planners.

But the thing about travelling is things always don’t go the way you plan them.

You don’t think to add in other factors like your boat captain crashing into Crete (oh yes he did.)

In this trip we flew into London, did the London thing, jetted off to Greece, cruised the Greek islands, then flew to Dublin for the weekend and flew back to London before we left for home (we actually went to Amsterdam at the end of the trip…not by choice but I’ll get to that later.)

It’s story time.

The cruise was fun, a little ridiculous. Before our trip people would say, “Oh a Greek island cruise? Party time.” Ha. 90% of the passengers were above the age of 50. But we had a grand ol time.

So, on this Greek Island cruise we were SO excited for this island. When people go to Greece all they talk about is this island. Movies always feature this island. Basically, I REALLY WANTED TO GO TO THIS ISLAND.

Santorini- the island that got away.

Yes, I had been hoping and dreaming of Santorini. I really, really, wanted to ride a donkey on Santorini. I really, really wanted to see the little houses on Santorini. I really, really, wanted to see the sunset on Santorini.

Sadly, none of this happened.

It was just another day at sea. We had been docked in Crete (where our tour guide told us to use this morning as a sleep in, as there is nothing to do in Crete). We awoke beyond excited for our afternoon and evening in Santorini. It was like the night before Christmas. Random thoughts were spoken out loud,

“I’m too scared to go on the donkey!”

“Ah! I can’t wait to go on the donkey!”

“We’re going to die on the freaking donkey!”

As you can see, we were really excited about the donkey.

And then it happened.

The announcement.

My memory is a bit foggy of this unfortunate day and even some of the other girls refuse to talk about it to this day.

“Our captain had an accident leaving Crete and we are not able to go to Santorini.”

First of all.. WHAT! Our captain crashed the cruise ship?

And second of all, NO SANTORINI!!!!!!!!!!!

Our hearts were crushed. Absolutely crushed. Even though we were having an amazing trip, no amounts of British chocolate could make up for the fact that we were not going to Santorini.

We turned our teensy tv to the channel that was hooked up to a camera on the outside of the ship. We put on our life jackets (obviously we were sinking). We viewed that teensy tv for hours upon hours. (Actually it was probably about 20 minutes). We talked about walking around the ship with our life jackets on but then we realized that may be a bit ridiculous. We were faced with a decision. Do we sit and mope or do we get out of our teensy inside facing (we were on a budget) room? We chose the latter. We went on, ate some food, laughed about the experience and enjoyed our last afternoon at sea. (FYI: tanning on the top of a Greek Island Cruise Ship seems like a good idea…remember to factor in the wind…it was literally freezing..don’t be deceived by our photos)

Sometimes in life, things may not always turn out the way you plan.

Actually a lot of times things don’t turn out the way you plan.

When I was younger I wanted to be a lawyer…or a memaid.  If I thought of myself at twenty-four, I would be married and have at least one child. HA. That would be insane. I have come to accept that most times, things don’t happen the way I intend.

But I am ok with that. My Father holds eternity in His hands. He knows me inside and out and knows what I need and what I don’t need. It’s a lot easier when you don’t get stuck on yourself for things not going the way you plan and instead enjoy life, laugh and trust that He has the greatest plan for you.

Proverbs 16:9 NLT

We can make our plans,
      but the Lord determines our steps.

Don’t sit around in your lifejacket contemplating why things didn’t go the way you planned. Trust in Him. I once heard a sermon analogy from Judah Smith. He explained that life was like a parade…a big long parade. We are on the sidelines watching it go by and sometimes a horse poops in front of you and it’s gross and smelly. We get sad and mad and freak out and want to be somewhere else. But God is in that news helicopter above the parade.

He can see the whole parade.

The beginning and the end.

He sees the pooper scooper people a block away from you (who will get rid of that gross horse poop). He sees that two blocks away are the people who hand out candy. He sees the entire parade and you are exactly where you need to be.

Stay gold my friends,

s.s.♥.

ps. Oh that time where our plane broke and we were forced to stay in Amsterdam with only the clothes on our back and our carry on luggage full of breakable items we didn’t want to put in our checked baggage…yeah I’ll save that for another time ;)