By Land or by Sea

A bit tired of finding our own fun, we decided to be real tourists for a day and let someone bring the fun to us. We booked a tour that included a few hours exploring the volcano lip, a dip in the nearby hot springs, followed up by a sunset cruise that was described to us as"THE life affirming sunset."
Turns out the most fun part of the day was actually getting to the tour company, which was waaaay down at the bottom of the caldera (look it up), and since we were running late we took the donkey taxis down.  Awesome! Jake managed to be very poorly located when a certain donkey decided to relieve himself.
The volcano was... hot, shocking. We were total wimps and sat in the shade for most of our allotted exploring time.
The hot springs were quite an adventure, a little reminiscent of the dolphin incident. It was 5:30pm by the time we made it to the hot springs. The boat parked about 100 yards away from the springs and they told us we would have to jump in and quickly swim the rest of the way. This is a problem for two reasons.
1. My aforementioned swimming abilities
2. That water is cold! It is only early May, and the Mediterranean does not stay at bath water temperature all year (a fact Jake neglected to mention when planning this trip).
Jake didn't think he could convince me to come along, so he hopped in the water and just left me! This total lack of faith, coupled with some serious heckling by the Japanese passengers (seriously, they were taunting me!) found me spluttering and frantically dog paddling towards warmer water. Unfortunatly, these were less hot springs and more like luke-warm springs, but at least I can say I experienced them!

There is real fear behind those sunglasses 

Jake about 8 seconds before he was pooped on by another donkey

I risked my life on the back of my donkey to take this photo. 

Tour boat. 

Tour boat in front of lava

Volcano hole

Our lives were indeed affirmed with this sunset