The 5-day Mount Athos hiking tour is a private hike from Ouranoupoli across the monastic peninsula of Athos, with nights in monastery guest houses and the entry permit included. Tours across the rest of the country are listed on Greece Tours. The sections below cover what the 5-day Mount Athos hiking tour includes, how it … Read more
A Mount Athos cruise sails from Ouranoupoli or Ormos Panagias along the west coast of the Holy Mountain, past monasteries that only men with a permit can enter, and returns the same day. Tours across the rest of the country are listed on Greece Tours. The sections below cover the cruises you can book, the … Read more
A Meteora private tour is a day with your own driver or licensed guide to the monasteries on the rock pillars of Meteora, from Athens, Thessaloniki, Volos or Ioannina, or a shorter private loop from your hotel in Kalabaka. Tours across the rest of the country are listed on Greece Tours. The sections below cover … Read more
A Meteora day trip from Halkidiki is a full-day excursion from the resorts of Kassandra and Sithonia to the rock-top monasteries of Meteora in Thessaly. The drive takes 3.5 to 4.5 hours each way. Tours across the rest of the country are listed on Greece Tours. The sections below cover the tours you can book, … Read more
Mount Athos is the monastic republic that fills the third and easternmost finger of Halkidiki, a self-governed peninsula of twenty ruling monasteries closed to the wider world by an ancient rule. The cruise from Thessaloniki carries travellers along its west coast, close enough to read the walls, towers, and domes of the monasteries from the … Read more
Akrotiri is a broad, rocky peninsula reaching north-east from Chania in western Crete. The peninsula holds the city’s airport, the deep natural harbour of Souda Bay, and a scatter of beaches and historic monasteries across its bare hills. Clifftop religious sites, the sandy cove of Stavros, and the hilltop graves of the statesman Eleftherios Venizelos … Read more
The Meteora frescoes rank among the finest post-Byzantine wall paintings in Greece. The katholika, the main churches of the monasteries perched on their sandstone pillars, hold dense narrative cycles painted mostly in the sixteenth century. Gold and dark grounds, elongated expressive figures and richly organised feast scenes define the Cretan School style that shaped this … Read more
Meteora rewards families who plan around the stairs rather than fight them. Six Byzantine monasteries crown sandstone pillars above the towns of Kalabaka and Kastraki, and children love the sheer scale of the rock towers, the birds wheeling overhead, and the tales of monks hauled up in rope nets. The catch is access: each monastery … Read more
Meteora rewards a slower pace, and two days let you do it properly. Six monasteries crown these sandstone pillars above Kalabaka, and each closes one weekday, so a single day always leaves a gap. Spread the visits across two mornings and you enter all six, walk the old monk footpaths that wind between the rocks, … Read more
Meteora is compact once you arrive. A single paved ring road climbs out of Kalabaka, threads through Kastraki, and links all six active monasteries: the Great Meteoron, Varlaam, Rousanou, Holy Trinity, St Nicholas Anapausas, and St Stephen. The full circuit runs only three kilometres, yet the road climbs and winds around the pillars, so the … Read more
Meteora rewards an early, tightly planned day. The six monasteries sit on sandstone pillars above Kalabaka and Kastraki, each perched on its own rock and each closed one weekday, so a single day works only when you set the order before you drive. This itinerary bases you in Kalabaka, sends you up the ring road … Read more
Great Meteoron crowns the Broad Rock above Kalabaka, the tallest and largest of the six working monasteries that give Meteora its fame. The full name is the Holy Monastery of the Transfiguration of Christ, and locals call it Megalo Meteoro. Its stone buildings rise near six hundred metres, reached by a long flight of carved … Read more