Update, #SPRANGBREAKKK was a major success. But then again, how could ten days of Greek Island hopping be anything but amazing? Ask my bruised thigh, pride, or my swollen foot. They are not my biggest fans at the moment so I am sure they will be happy to tell you.
Okay so these are both two very long stories, one dripping with such comical gold you honestly had to be there to fully appreciate it. The other one is not so funny. Before we get into it, I want to say that these unusual series of events had absolutely no negative impact on my time in Greece. If anything, they made it a more personalized experience to share. On the real, Athens, Santorini, and Corfu posed the perfect combination of history, #aesthetic, and #SPRANGBREAKKK .
Athens: Home of the ancient Acropolis, Parthenon, first modern Olympic stadium, among an almost literal million other things.
Like I said, history. Next, we were off to Santorini; this is where things got… lmao. But somehow first, I managed to allow myself just one chill day to myself. Santorini was my high school craving that never went away, and finally, I was here to experience it.
I scaled mountains for five hours, alone, to fulfill my first ever travel dream of seeing the blue domes over the Aegean Sea. Honestly, I did not even bother reading far enough of the Fira-Oia hiking trail directions to see what I was really getting myself into – as if that would have changed anything. Admittedly, the Grecian “Black Mountain” only came to existence when my eyes fell just long enough to realize that the dust being kicked from under my feet had changed from crimson to charcoal. Convinced I was screwed, a more in-depth look at the directions revealed two things: 1) I, in fact, did not get lost on a semi-abandoned foreign coastline, and 2), Next time, I could afford reading a few more sentences before I do :).
At the end of the day, I made it. Just in time for sunset, actually. And it was one of the coolest, most worthwhile things I ever did. Oia, one of Santorini’s many gems, was everything I had hoped for and more. Seriously, the Instagram pictures do not do it justice. I have found this to be true for almost any picture taken in Europe. Of course, as every other traveler/world lover can relate, this has proven itself time and time again to be both a blessing and a curse. I am so deeply in love with the separate ventures that somehow intertwine to form the experience that I am so unbelievably fortunate to have. But, with this in-person, individualized experience, there really just are no words, or even pictures, to convey, even the most seemingly minute part of it. The curse or the sad part is not that we want others to see how great our moments are, but that we want them to be able to feel them too. And they just cannot; or at least not until they decide to go off on their own ventures, and experience the it all in their own way.
Allora: An Italian word, far too challenging to explain via writing, yet I still insist on saying it.
Now that I had had my one on one time with Santorini, it was time to meet back up with the group in Oia to return to our stay in Fira… to uh, “Americanize” this Greek spring break, if you catch my drift. But of course, the rowdiness couldn’t stop there, oh God no. College, man, ya gotta love it!
And so the good times rolled over into Corfu where ya girl rolled over a small cliff into a pricker-bush, filled ditch, with her oh so loyal ATV on top of her! Along with every other random misfortune life has thrown my way thus far, I take pride in being able to let humor overshadow the potential gravity of the situation.
“So good, dude… so good it hurts,” with a fat smirk and bleeding limbs, might not have been what our ATV instructor expected to hear when he checked up on me. You didn’t think I threw in the towel just like that, did ya? Pfft, please. Growing up an athlete, I broke things I did not even know could be broken, like it was my job. I never sat out then (by my own choice, at least), you think I am going to bench myself now – in Greece?
I was definitely going to be wearing pants for a while though hahaha. Aside from that, my foot was in less than stellar shape, but hey, spring break! The group was headed to the Beach Bar for the night and I would be damned if I was not leading the way. What can I say? Some things never change.
And because some things do not change, in celebration, ya girl decided to jump off a, particularly high table, without even remotely accounting for her fragile foot! Allora, though I could barely stand, our remaining time in Greece became the ultimate ending to a spring break for the books. Truly some of the fondest memories I have, ever. And despite some of these less than ideal obstacles, I do not regret any of it. If nothing else, they make for a hell of a story! I am still standing.
UAlbany Project MyStory 
0 comments on “Mountains & Broken Things: No Stopping Me”