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Greece

The last finger of Halkidiki and we are sailing south again.

Pasicevo Wild Beach, Ammouliani

After saying goodbye to Miriam we drove back to the boat, delivered the car and stayed one more night in the bay of Ormos Panagias. The next morning we went to the dock and filled up our watertanks, before we sailed over to the eastern finger. (had a short swimstop before we left Diaporos island)

We sailed to the eastern side of the island Ammouliani, the only island in Halkidiki with inhabitants. We found a bay for ourself and we had an amazing evening. For the first time we went ashore to eat our dinner on the beach. We made pizza onboard, but brought it to the beach.

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It was so quiet and nice.

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And Astor took the dishes!

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After sunset when the temperature is lower it is still warm in the sea, so we had to swim back to the boat, Astor towing the dinghy.

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We anchored and had a line ashore and we had a couple of nice nights there. The first morning we decided to go hiking and explore the island.

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In the beginnning we run some intervals, before we head up the hill. We found on google maps a trail we hoped excisted…

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We went over the hill to this nice beach on the west side of the island.

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Up in the hil we got a nice view over the island. The main town is on the eastern side.

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From the beach it was a bit steep hill on a gravel road.

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After some hundred meters it was hard to find the trail…

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And it was getting worse…. at this point we maybe should have turned around, but…

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It was a lot of sharp bushes, but we tried to find our way out of this mess….

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If you don`t like a challenge, don`t go here…

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But we manage to find a way back to the main road and I was happy we didn`t found a closed fence at the end of the trail, that has happend before…

Here is where we did this hike:

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In the afternoon we took our dinghy into the small marina south of the village and walked to the center of the village.

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A cozy place, very quiet and not many tourists.

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The port was full of boats, most locals.

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And some of them has a job to do…

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The village seen from the port.

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Many restaurants and some small shops, so you will find what you need.

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Outside a restaurant. I am not sure if it something on theese barrels.

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Typically touristic, right??

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We had some “fast” food here before we walked back to the dinghy.

Ouranoupolis, the eastern finger

The next day we sailed over to the mainland – the eastern finger. We wanted to see the town of Ouranoupolis. This is the town to visit if you are going to Athos. Well, if you are a woman, you can`t go there. Why?? It has been like this for ages. Almost the whole eastern finger south of Ouranoupolis is monastery land. It is not allowed for women to visit this place, and only men with invitation can come there.

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The village was really a nice place, but this was very early in the morning so very quiet. Most of the people were running to reach the ferries.

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Some shops and many restaurants along the seaside.

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Byzantine tower of Prosphorion. This tower is the largest and best preserved tower in Halkidiki. It was build in 12 and 13 century. Today it is a museum inside.

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The church of Holy Constantine and Helen, layes in the middle of the town. It was hard to get a good photo from outside. Inside it was beautiful with all theese paintings.

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After a couple of hours in Ouranoupolis we started to sail south along the coastline of the eastern finger. Here is the tower seen from the boat.

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The tower

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Athos

This is the Monastery of Zygos, and the only monastery here you can visit. This is right before the border to Athos. Athos is a Monastic community with 20 monasteries, and 2000 monks. Women is not allowed to enter, even not animals (except from cats). Daily visitors to Mount Athos are restricted to 100 lay Orthodox and 10 non-Orthodox male pilegrims.

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Nea Thivaida. It is not allowed to sail closer than 500 meters, so it was hard to take good photos.

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There is so many buildings, and they are huge! I wish I could go here!

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Dochiariou Monastery

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It looks like they are renovating the church in the middle.

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Agios Ioannis Theologos

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Xenophontos Monastery

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St. Panteleimon Monastery

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Xeropotamou Monastery

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Simonos Petra Monastery

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It is amazing to see how they have been building this huge monastery on a rock!

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Iera Moni Osiou Dionysiou Agiou Orous

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Someone says this is the most beautiful on Mount Athos. And with Mount Athos in the background! The mountain is 2033 masl.

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It is so nice view with the mountain in the background! Wish I could go there!

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It was amazing to see all the houses build up in the hill. Here is no roads!!

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Even higher up!

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It was amazing to sail outside Athos and see all the monastery. Of course there are many more, but many of them you can`t see from the sea.

It was time to leave the eastern finger and we sailed over to the mid finger, again. We anchored in Paralia Kriaritsi pritty late, but it was a beautiful evening and very quiet. There is a campingsite ashore and some small pubs or whatever, we didn`t checked it out, and it was not noisy.

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When we sailed here on the way to Diaporos island we saw something strange. It was a lot of small roads ashore, and when we googled it, it seems to be a plan to build a huge village here. Now it is called “ghost city”. It is 75 km with roads, because they already made theese, but because no one is living here (almost) it is not much traffic. So we decided to wake up before sunrise (05.45) and have a morning walk/run.

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It was beautiful to see the sun rise behind Mount Athos. You can see Felizia anchored in the bay.

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Many roads to choose from!

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This is how it should look like.

Ghost city

Some roads with asfalt, some gravel roads, some concrete, and some natural trails.

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An amazing morning. And it is so quiet this early. Actually it was a bit cold in the air, it was much warmer in the sea!

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It was not easy to see from the sea but it was quite steep up the hill from the beach.

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Nice view everywhere.

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And a stair in the middle of nowhere, ends in the middle of nowhere…

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It was steeper than it looks like in photos!

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The trail/roads went up and down, so it was very good for excersising!

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It was easy to see that they build all theese roads in thought of building houses later.

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I am ready to run the hill!

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Up the hill we go!

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Nice view from the top of the hill down to the bay.

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When we came back to the beach nearly no one was awake and it was still quiet. We swam back to the boat, Astor towing the dinghy.

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It was a lot of tents and caravans on the beach.

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We hoisted the anchor and started to sail south against the Sporades. We were not sure where the wind should take us. But we manage to arrive Alonissos before sunset.

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Since it was late and it was space at the dock, we moored there. It was only one another sailboat there. Quiet place and no swell!

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Visiting Halkidiki was really nice. I would love to go back there in another time of the year, when it is cooler and we can do more hiking and exploring. We`ll see where the road takes us!

After a short stop on Skiathos we will next time be sailing to the bay of Volos and explore the stunning landscape of Meteora. Check us out next week!

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