Honeymoon in Greece - Dreams Luxury Suites Santorini

I saved the best for last. This is all about our hotel in Santorini...one of the best and most luxurious hotels I've ever been in. They only have like 6 suites and they're all different. They are all designed in the traditional Cycladic style, which is like cave dwellings. And each one with a private terrace with pools and/or jacuzzis. It is beyond gorgeous and they keep the place spotless! Housekeeping came twice a day, so the room and terrace is always clean. Our suite, Iokasti, had both a pool and jacuzzi. I think the pool is a necessity since it's so hot during the day. I'd make sure I spent some time every day in the pool and laying out on the lounge chairs. :) 

Dreams Luxury Suites
Imerovigli, Santorini
www.dreamsluxurysuites.com
 

The service Was on point!!! The hotel managers, Vivian and Ioanna, were fabulous. Always eager to help and super nice. They gave us a ton of great recommendations and took care of everything for us. All we had to do was ask, and they would do the rest. And Giannis, not sure what his title is, but he did everything! From taking our bags to the rooms, room service, and fixing anything around the hotel. They truly made it a real vacation for us. By the end of our stay, we had become friends. I hope we can visit them again in the future.

Now... the food!! OMG. Some of the best meals we had on the trip was at the hotel. They had a brilliant in house chef that made everything fresh including all the breads baked from scratch. We had free breakfast every morning. As much as we wanted. :)
By day 3, we had pretty much figured out all the things we liked best and just ordered multiple quantities of each. haha.

First night dinner. We sat on a deck that had a better view of the sunset. Apparently Imerovigli doesn't have a great sunset view because of it's location. But still, we can see most of it and it's really nice. 

Breads (with red pepper sauce). The breads were warm and perfectly fluffy on the inside. That sauce... oh man. We asked for extras.

Caprese (tomatoes, balsamic, mozzarella, pesto) Everything was so fresh and amazing. Greek tomatoes are awesome. 

Salmon Tagliatelle. One of the most memorable pasta dishes I've ever had. The pasta was perfectly cooked. The salmon was tender and perfect with the cream sauce. It was soooooo good!

Risotto Primavera (saffron, zucchini, carrots). This was just ok... needed meat for sure.
And seriously... everything looks and tastes better with this view!

We took our dessert back at our private patio. Ravani. Not exactly what kind of cake this is. But the cake is soaked with some sort of syrup. And the ice cream is topped with caramel sauce that doesn't taste like any caramel I've had before.

The breakfast... Oh the breakfast. One of the highlights of everyday. I'm just going to list everything I remember that we had throughout our stay.
Croissants - our favorite thing. We doubled our order after we discovered how good they were. Baked in house. Super buttery and fluffy. Perfect with their marmalade and honey. These were a staple every morning. 

French Toast
Greek Omelette. They're baked in a dish instead of a omelette you'd find in the states.
Spinach Pie
Smoked Salmon
Fresh fruit
Homemade Marmalade
Honey (it tastes different in Greece. It's lighter!) 

 

Apple Juice, Orange Juice, Pineapple Juice. They gave us a complimentary bottle of champagne when we arrived so we got juice in the morning to make our own mimosas! Cheers!

 

 

 

Iced Coffee
Bacon and Eggs. This turned out to be our favorite main dish. We ordered it a lot.

Homemade Mosaiko (with chocolate sauce)

Hot Tea
Corn Flakes
Museli

Cheese Sandwich

Cucumber, Tomatoes, and Olives

Chocolate Cereal
Toast with Tapenade 
Hot Chocolate 

Ham and Egg Scramble

We had lunch in the hotel one day. Just shared an order of the Club Sandwich since we had a big breakfast. The sandwich was good, but the fries stole the show! Those wedges were fried to perfection!! I couldn't stop eating them!

 

Last night in Santorini. We decided to have a quiet dinner on our terrace. They come and make it look all romantic too. With lanterns and table cloth and stuff. :)
The hotel sent us a gift (Greek olive oil), and complimentary smoothies for our last day.

Everyone at the hotel are super sweet. I miss them so much. 
Breads (with red pepper sauce). We ordered double this time, plus extra sauce. hehe. 

Caprese (tomatoes, balsamic, mozzarella, pesto) 

Salmon Tagliatelle. We had to get this one more time before we left. Still amazing!

Chicken Fettucine. This was also delicious. They used dark meat chicken so it was super tender. The pasta was perfectly al dente. Yum!!

One of the most fabulous and relaxing stays of my life. I'm so glad I found Dreams Luxury Suites. I highly highly recommend it. Even if you just go for 1-2 nights...it's well worth the money! And I'm glad I chose Imerovigli to stay in. It's much quieter, and the view is just absolutely breathtaking!

Quality of Food:

Service:

Ambiance:

Value:

Overall Experience:

 

~~ CHOMP CHOMP ~~

Honeymoon in Greece - Santorini Eats

Oh Santorini... it's been at the top of my travel list forever. So why not go for our honeymoon. It really is a beautiful place. You can't walk 2 steps without snapping a picture...at least I couldn't. It made our "15 min" walk from Imerovigli (where we stayed) to Fira more like 45 minutes. hahaha.

There was certainly an abundance of food. But it was so hot during the day, I didn't really have much of an appetite. So we usually just ate a big breakfast, snacked throughout the day, then have a light/normal dinner. This is one of the first times where the trip is not all about the food. :P

Most of the places we ate at were recommended by our hotel manager. I have a separate post about our hotel, which is basically paradise. It deserves it's own post.

Aegeon Restaurant - Imerovigli. This was a short walk from our hotel. Imerovigli is a small town between Oia and Fira. We liked it a lot. It was less crowded and much quieter.
Fresh Tagliatelle (from cuttlefish ink with grouper fillet) 19,80E~ Very good but was overshadowed by my salmon. hehe. I love me some squid ink pasta tho!

Grilled Salmon (with steamed vegetables, quinoa, and hollandaise sauce) 18,50E~ One of the best salmon I've ever had. Beautifully presented too. The salmon was cooked to perfection and was crispy on the outside. The entire bottom of the fish was crispy!

 

Lemon Meringue Tart. This was very good. Again, plating is nice. The crust wasn't super hard to cut into as I've experienced a lot with lemon tarts. It was quite large too. 

Cappuccino 4,00E~

These were given to us with the check. Complimentary.

Raki - an unsweetened, anise-flavored distilled spirit. I've become a super duper lightweight since before the wedding since alcohol made me break out, so I could barely handle 2 sips of this. My husband drank it all. He really enjoyed it. haha.
Mosaiko - homemade chocolate/biscuit cake. First time having this. Sooooo good. But they don't sell it. It's homemade. So I had to look up the recipe when we got back to the states. Gotta make it sometime!


Fira:
Gelato. We went to this place twice during our trip. They had some interesting flavors. And also really yummy looking desserts. We didn't try any of those tho.

 

 

 

 

 

#FoodBar. This was snack one day. A cute little shop. The chairs were swings!
Pork Skewer 1,50E~ Basically pork belly on a stick. With a little salt. Deeeelish!

 

Pita with Pork Gyros 2,50E~ Pretty tasty!

Crepe House
Loopino (mix of milk and white chocolate, fresh banana, caramel syrup) 6,00E~ It was ok. The crepe was well made, but needed ice cream for sure!

Oia. We were headed to Ammoudi Bay for some fresh seafood, as recommended by our hotel manager. It's at the farthest end of Oia. So we got there a little earlier to check out the town. It's nice, but sooo packed. Everyone was there waiting to see the famous sunset.
We came by the Crazy Donkey - cute little cafe on the way to Ammoudi Bay. Someone had recommended it to me through FB so we went in to check it out. My husband wanted to get something refreshing to drink anyways. It's hot in Santorini. Very hot!
Watermelon Juice. As fresh as can be. My husband loved it on a hot day. 

Brownie. All their desserts looked amazing. I started perusing the display case when he was looking at the menu and I HAD to get something. Even if I was to take one bite. haha. I've noticed they like to bake their brownies like a round cake and cut slices out of it. I saw it at several bakeries. It was dark, and yummy. 

We also got Kataifi to go since we had the ice cream flavor in Athens. And we've never had it. Were not fans of it...haha. Too much of the hair stuff and needed more filling. The inside is like the inside of a baklava.

Ammoudi Bay. To get to this place, you have to climb down over 200+ steps. And be careful of the donkey doo-doo! People can pay to ride donkey's up the steps. So yay for those of us on foot! Watch your step! Thank goodness it was still light when we climbed down. The way back up however.... eeeeks! hahaha.
Ammoudi Fish Tavern. There was a whole bunch of restaurants along the water serving up fresh seafood. But this is the one our hotel manager recommended and had made a reservation for us.
Agioritiki Eggplant Salad (baked local flasks or white aubergines with garlic, onion, parsley, and extra virgin olive oil) 5,80E~ For someone that doesn't like eggplant, I sure love Greek eggplants. haha. We had it several times in Greece and all of them have been fantastic. This isn't much to look at, but it was so good. 

Sun-dried Octopus (grilled) 14,50E~ Gotta have octopus! Again, delicious!!

Seafood Quartetto (salmon, shrimp, clams, white fish) 25,00E~ This was ok. I loved the white fish and the cream sauce, but the clams were super gritty. The view was nice though.

Lolita's Gelato. Cuz we can never have too much ice cream. This was on the way to the bus stop to head back to our hotel.

We rented an ATV one day and drove down to the Red Beach and Black Beach. It was cheaper than taking a cab or renting a car and more flexible than waiting around for buses. It was an interesting but still fun experience. hehe. My first time on an ATV!
The red beach was first. Beautiful, but super rocky. You have to take a short hike to get to the actual beach. And up close the water was quite dirty. Not a great place to hang out for a long time, so we only stayed for about an hour or so.

Headed to Perissa - Black Beach for some lunch!
Tranquilo - recommended by our hotel manager. HUGE salads for cheap she says.. She wasn't joking!

XL Caesar Salad (fresh green salad, grilled chicken, parmesan, corn, croutons, special Caesar sauce) 11,00E~ This thing is bigger than my head. We made it through 2/3rds and couldn't finish it. Cheapest meal yet! And they seem to put corn in their Caesar salads here, I can dig it. :P Sorry for the photo quality...

 

The black beach is totally my kind of place. A long row of restaurants and bars on one side, the beach and lounge chairs on the other. We parked ourselves in front of one of the restaurants. The waiters come to you on the beach, while you relax and lounge. That's the life!

Pistachio Milkshake

Waffle (butterscotch ice cream, caramel sauce)

We stuck around til dinner time and grabbed some food before heading back.
Pergola Restaurant - we just looked at their menu and walked in. The food prices in Perissa were significantly cheaper than Fira/Oia. The portions were bigger too and just as delicious!
Fried Calamari (with fish roe dip) 6,90E~ One of the best calamaris I've ever had. No breading but crispy and tender and so much flavor. 

Caramelized Octopus (with fresh mashed eggplants) 8,50E~ The octopus was super tender. However, the caramelization made it quite sweet.. other than that it was good.

Sunset Sail with Spiridakos Sailing Cruises:
Our hotel also highly recommended doing a sail. It was a bit pricey but why not! We're in Greece! And I'm so glad we did it, it was a great experience. They provide everything, from transportation to and from hotel, give you towels, tour around the island, visit the caldera, and even cook you a feast! The meal was magnificent and I'm so impressed it was all cooked on a catamaran!
Spaghetti with Tomato Sauce, Grilled Chicken, Grilled Shrimp, Greek Salad, Crispy Fried Shrimp, Bread, and Dips. So delicious and so much food. I was stuffed!

 

 

 

Last day in Fira:
We went souvenir shopping and got some snacks. Randomly walked by this little cafe...and had to stop by their dessert display...

 

 

We had one night in Athens before flying out early the next morning, so we stayed in the airport hotel, Sofitel. Went to one of their restaurants, Mesoghaia, for dinner.
The bread was free here, so we ate ALL of it. hahaha

Traditional Moussaka (slices of potatoes, eggplant, zucchini, and minced beef; finalized with a "mornay" sauce) 16,00E~ I realized I haven't had a single moussaka since I've been here. And it's one of my favorite Greek dishes so I had to get it. It was beautiful. The prettiest presentation of moussaka I've ever seen, and I think one of the tastiest too! So glad I got it. 

Crispy Cod (tempura style garnished with local greens, homemade mashed potato, and aioli sauce with saffron from Kozani) 16,00E~ This was another story... left a lot to be desired. Portion was pretty small too. Luckily the moussaka was huge so I shared.

I think it was a pretty good food overall. But believe me when I say the food wasn't the best part. Everyone should experience Santorini sometime. And splurge to get the nice hotels on the side of the cliff, with the cave like architecture. It's amazing!

~~ CHOMP CHOMP ~~