Santorini is a small, circular archipelago of volcanic islands located in the southern Aegean Sea, about 200 km southeast from Greece's mainland. It is formed from what remains of an enormous volcanic explosion that destroyed early settlements on a single island. Santorini features spectacular cliffs, villages situated on the cliffs overlooking a central lagoon surrounded by the steep cliffs, and an impressive caldera landscape. The island was the site of one of the largest volcanic eruptions in history, the Minoan eruption around 3,600 years ago.