We stayed for 3 nights in middle of June 2016. The view from the villa is as WONDERFUL as it looks!! It’s also fantastic to have your own pool facing that view! The villa faces the caldera on one side and the opposite side faces the back of the island – the best of both worlds. Fabulous location, NO steep steps, quiet, and only 10 mins walk into the start of Oia. The villa is in the town of Finikia, on the main road between Fira & Oia. You walk or drive up a gentle sloping medium length driveway to get to it. There is a car park at the end of the driveway right near the villa. Within 5 min walking distance is a bus stop, a taverna, and a mini supermarket with a good range of products including alcohol and gluten free cornflakes! More mini supermarkets are further down. To walk to Oia you need to go on the main road for a short while then turn off left up a small lane and take the paved footpath along the rim of the caldera into Oia. It’s the prettiest route with the least traffic.
The villa is two levels. UPSTAIRS - living/dining room, kitchen and access to patio and pool. The kitchen has plenty of crockery and cutlery. The dining table only seats 4. The lounge area only seats 4. We didn’t use the sofa bed. We only used the toaster in the kitchen and the TV in the lounge room and both worked fine. A cleaner cleaned inside the villa daily. The pool was cleaned daily. DOWNSTAIRS (about 14 stairs) - 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. There are large cupboards in both bedrooms. The yellow bedroom has a lovely soft bed and the blue bedroom has a firm bed. The smaller (yellow) bathroom is very small and you need to be forgiving for the lack of space but everything works fine. The larger (red) bathroom is good! There are hand held showers in both bathrooms. The villa was cool enough that we didn’t need to use any of the air conditioners.
Ari communicated well with us before we arrived, answered all our questions and helped us arrange a hire car - 50 euros/day for a Micra (manual) - full insurance - 300 euro excess. He offered to arrange tours for us but we didn’t need any. Ari gave us a good briefing upon arrival. If you want to use the TVs in the bedrooms, make sure you ask him to show you during the initial briefing. I’d recommend staying here. The price for what you get is very reasonable for Santorini.