Greece Travel Guide

Trip Holidays Greece offers travel tips and information for top travel places and best destinations. We feature links, resources and large selection of budget airlines, chartered planes, sea cruises, ferries, travel agencies, land transports and attractions including beaches, medical tourism, retirement homes, historical and pilgrimage tours.

Greece Attractions

Athens (Athens Hotels & Athens Resort Reservation Service)

Athens ranks with Rome and Jerusalem for its glorious past, yet few fall in love with the modern city. Most visitors never see beyond the nefos (smog) and the high-rise apartment blocks built hurriedly to house the refugees who poured in from Asia Minor during the 1923 population exchange with Turkey. But beyond the off-putting veneer of concrete there is a kind of dilapidated charm. Almost every house and apartment has a balcony bulging with geraniums, and many of the city's streets and squares are fringed with orange trees. Athens is a curious blend of east and west; its raucous street vendors and colourful markets are reminiscent of Turkish bazaars, while crumbling neoclassical mansions hark back to the city's brief heyday as the 'Paris of the Mediterranean'.

The Acropolis , crowned by the Parthenon, stands sentinel over Athens and is visible from almost everywhere in the city. Pericles set about transforming the Acropolis into a city of temples after being informed by the Delphic oracle in 510 BC that it should become a province of the gods. The city was a showcase of colossal buildings, lavishly coloured and gilded, and of gargantuan statues, some of bronze, others of marble plated with gold and encrusted with precious stones. Now in ruins, the cool grandeur of the bare marble is still breathtaking. Beside the Parthenon , which is unsurpassed in its grace and harmony, is the Erechtheion , immediately recognisable for its much-photographed Caryatids, the six maidens who take the place of columns. The Ancient Theatre of Dionysos , where every Athenian citizen took their turn in the chorus of Greek tragedies, is on the southern slope of the Acropolis.

Nestled into the northeastern slope of the Acropolis is the old village of Plaka , virtually all that existed of Athens before it was declared the capital of independent Greece. Its narrow labyrinthine streets retain much of their charm despite gross commercialism. Fenced off on the verge of Plaka is the ancient Agora (marketplace) which formed the centre of social and civic life in ancient Athens. Other attractions include the National Archaeological Museum , which houses magnificent gold artefacts from Mycenae and spectacular Minoan frescoes from Santorini (Thira), among other exquisite objects and antiquities; and the Goulandris Museum of Cycladic & Ancient Greek Art , with a collection of the elegant marble figurines that inspired the likes of Modigliani, Brancusi and Picasso.

Plaka is the most popular area to stay, and some budget hotels may let you sleep on the roof in summer. Book in advance in July and August though, as Athens becomes overrun with tourists.

Peloponnese (Peloponnese Hotels & Peloponnese Resort Reservation Service)

The Peloponnese, Greece's southern peninsula, is rich in history and scenically diverse. Packed into its northeastern corner are the ancient sites of Epidaurus , Corinth and Mycenae , all easily reached from Nafplio . The ghostly, capacious Byzantine city of Mystras clambers up the slopes of Mt Taygetos, its winding paths and stairways leading to deserted palaces and fresco-adorned churches.

Further south, you can explore the Mani , a region of bleak mountains and barren landscapes broken only by austere and imposing stone towers, mostly abandoned but still standing sentinel over the region. Other attractions in the region include ancient Olympia , the beautiful medieval town of Monemvasia and the thrilling Diakofto-Kalavryta rack-and-pinion railway, which rollercoasts its way through the deep Vouraïkos Gorge.

Meteora (Meteora Hotels & Meteora Resort Reservation Service)

The World Heritage monasteries of Meteora, in the province of Thessaly, are one of the most extraordinary sights in mainland Greece. Built into and on top of huge pinnacles of smooth rock with cheese-like holes in it, the monasteries provided monks with peaceful havens from increasing bloodshed as the Byzantine Empire waned at the end of the 14th century. The earliest monasteries were reached by climbing articulated removable ladders. Later, windlasses were used so monks could be hauled up in nets, a method used until the 1920s. Apprehensive visitors enquiring how often the ropes were replaced were told 'When the Lord lets them break'. These days access to the monasteries is by steps hewn into the rocks and the windlasses are used only for hauling up provisions.

Cyclades (Cyclades Hotels & Cyclades Resort Reservation Service)

The Cycladic islands epitomise the postcard image of the Greek islands: dazzling white buildings are offset by bright-blue church domes, while golden beaches meet an aquamarine sea. Some of the Cyclades, such as Mykonos , Santorini , Paros and Ios , have vigorously embraced the tourist industry; others, such as Andros , Kea , Serifos and Sikinos , are visited infrequently by foreigners but are favourites with holiday-makers from Athens.

Mykonos is the most expensive and heavily visited of all Greek islands. It has the most sophisticated nightlife and is the undisputed gay capital of Greece. Barren, low-lying Mykonos would never win a Greek-island beauty contest, but it does have superb (if crowded) beaches. The town is an enchanting warren of chic boutiques and chimerical houses with brightly painted balconies draped in bougainvillea and clematis; it's too perfect for some tastes. Santorini (also known as Thira) is regarded by many as the most spectacular of the Greek islands. Thousands of tourists come every year to gape at the sea-filled caldera, a vestige of what was probably the world's largest volcanic eruption, ever. Despite the crowds who visit in summer, Santorini's weirdness, apparent in its black-sand beaches and mighty cliffs, holds a distinct allure.

If you want to escape the tourist hordes, Sikinos , Anafi and the tiny islands to the east of Naxos offer some respite.

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