I went to Europe’s most beautiful island and hated every minute of it

Santorini is one of the most beautiful islands in Europe – and a rotten place to go on holiday. 

Yes, the Greek island’s famous whitewashed walls are very white. Sure, the blue domes are very blue. Of course, the famous sunsets are very stunning.

But trust me when I say no number of sunsets or white walls or blue domes will ever make Santorini worth the money.

I recently had the misfortune of being one of the two million tourists who visit the island every year. My girlfriend and I were there for 36 hours at the end of an otherwise excellent nine-day trip to Greece, which had taken us through Athens and Naxos – both superb places. 

Santorini was never going to be the highlight of our holiday. We’d heard about the crowds and the costs and the chaos. We knew about the odd scam or two. But, we wondered, how bad could Europe’s most popular destination really be?

Bloody awful, it turns out.

We’d hardly been on the island for 10 minutes when we spotted hallmarks of all the worst tourist hotspots: an Indian restaurant in the Med, a dispensary selling “100% legal cannabis”, a seedy sex shop. No bother, we thought, nothing that can’t be ignored. Besides, we’d not even reached the main town yet.

Then the coach dropped us off in Fira. What opened up before us was a morass of madness that makes Leicester Square look like the Garden of Eden with an M&M World. American tourists gawped. Tat merchants peddled. Influencers snapped.

We finally reached our hotel after fighting through the knock offs and the Americans and the selfie-stick flailers. After a brief respite – and a cold shower – we were back in the mix. Briefly, the trip started to look up again. The views were just as beautiful as promised and the weather was no worse. 

But one hour and two drinks later, I was opening the EasyJet app as a stampede of rampaging donkeys pinned me against a wall. When could I get the first flight out of this dump? Not soon enough, unfortunately.

I admit I’m not the stoic sort. The stern stuff got lost somewhere in the genetic coding. But I’ve spoken to other Santorini veterans – tougher types – and the view is unanimous: your money is better spent elsewhere.

Yes, you can have a nice enough time with a romantic meal and a stunning sunset. And, if you have a lot of money, you’ll probably enjoy a decent day by the infinity pool. But you’ll be missing out on much more: the fun, the food, the beaches, the history and the culture available on almost every other Greek island.

Rip up your plans to visit Santorini. Take the cancellation fees on the chin. Rebook those flights. Then spend whatever you have left on a trip to Naxos and thank me later.

Have you been to Santorini? Share your thoughts on the island in the comments below.