So, the big day had finally arrived. The children still hadn’t met most of the people at the wedding and the Groom invited us up to his villa. So I thought, perfect… as the Groom’s family is quite large, so having already met all of the bridesmaids, this trip would mean the kids would know around half of the guests; As we were readying ourselves to go up, we got a message from the Bride freaking out about bus times and pickups… After a short “ok, if you need us to be picked up from ours, we’ll get the taxi back here, be ready and waiting at least 10 minutes ahead of time” she was ok and it was all good.
So, we headed up and had a somewhat chilled morning at their villa around the pool, overlooking the sea. It was beautiful. But, what the bride doesn’t know is that (well she will now ‘cause she reads this, and will find out – sorry) our taxi came in the wrong end of the road; there was a road closure to resurface part of the road – it wasn’t possible to get through. So they had to drive right up to the top of the cliff road and back down the other side. Our taxi was 30 minutes late. By the time he got us back I had 30 minutes to shower 2 children and myself, get ready and leave.
I got the kids completely sorted, but just as I was about to put my necklace and bracelet on, and do my hair, the groom was calling – they were early and at the top of the road waiting! The children were already ready, so it just called for me getting my shoes on – but they wouldn’t stay on, so I ran up the road, in mid-afternoon Santorini heat, with no shoes on. I would just like to comment here, my feet are quite hardy, from lots of barefoot adventures, but even I struggled with the sun heated black tar roads… so I really wouldn’t advise it.
Anyhow, the wedding was Santorini Gem and is next to Santo Wines. It was beautiful, they didn’t have to do much to achieve that, and they didn’t. I mean, of course they cleaned the place and kept it in good order, but to add too much to the venue would have detracted from the surrounding beauty; the views of the Caldera and volcano and up towards the north of the island. The chairs were setup with a few parasols at the front and the cabana was setup in a simple and elegant manner.
I would say “the ceremony was beautiful”, but to be honest, I was stressed out trying to keep a 8 and 5 year old happy in the direct sunshine, and slightly entertained by the toddler that had broken free and was running around. Once the ceremony was over, and photos taken, we headed out to the bus to take us to Pyrgos restaurant. We were out on the balcony for ages waiting for the bride and groom to arrive from their photo shoot, but the children were being plied with sugared strawberries and the adults with bubbly, and there was some shady seating… so no one really minded to be honest.
Once the bride and groom had arrived, cut the cake and had their first dance, we could finally head in for food. Which was excellent cause frankly, we were all getting a bit hot and hangry. And it was worth the wait indeed. The food was so scrumptious. I can’t really put any pictures up of the evening as it was all faces and people and I can’t really do that. But I can say, it was great. The staff even got involved in trying to teach 30 drunk brits how to Greek-dance – interesting and very funny.
The plan was that we would book a taxi when we could see the kids weren’t coping anymore… but thanks to meeting people beforehand, thanks to all the hard work and prep we had put into it and thanks to the amazing bunch of people who were there and paid them so much positive attention, we ended up having to call it a night around 11:30pm – the latest we have managed to keep them out by far.
Amazing day. Amazing couple. Amazing celebration. Amazing memories. And new friendships.
A Pleasant Chaos 