Aghios Nikolaos Monastery area on Lefkas Greece - Holiday Hiking around the South of the Island..

There are two short Lefkas walks described starting off from the Monastery of Aghios Nikolaos.

The longest takes you on down to the bottom of the Island to see the lighthouse at Akr. Lefkatas and the second is a wander around on the tracks by the Monastery.

Aghios Nikolaos Monastery to Akr. Lighthouse - there and back on tracks - undulates and is around 9kms total walking.
The monastery is located at the end of a dirt track not far from where the tarmac surfaced road ends and is well signposted. Located in a really nice grassy area with trees and shrubs surrounding it the monastery is a great place to visit and look round - the only disadvantage is that the Monastery itself is surrounded by high wire fences and the gates are padlocked.
Return back the short distance to the end of the tarmac road and turn left onto what has now become a track - on reaching a t-junction turn left again and follow this main track as it meanders and undulates to the lighthouse. You do get some pretty good views of the coastline and the lighthouse itself when it first comes into view is quite a spectacular sight. At one point the track turns very sharp left by some exposed rocky surfaces and here it is worth a careful climb up to look over the edges (these are fragile edges...).

The only puffy bit of the walk is the final few bends up to the lighthouse - our photo is a little dark but then it had just started raining. At the lighthouse you can find some shade and cool down (or in our case try and keep dry) and admire the coastline and surrounding small islands - and perhaps even watch the occasional passing ferry.
The way back is just a re-trace of the way out - we could find no path or other option to avoid this but nevertheless the views are different and it made a nice breezy walk in the countryside.

Monastery down to the beach which has no name - around 3.5kms or 5.5kms - nice steady walk down but somehow a lot steeper on the way up again - then a small circle round the hills before turning to the Monastery.

Totally uncomplicated walk but useful for a leg stretch and the flowers, wildlife, shrubs and trees are pretty nice along the way. Take the green track going to the left of the monastery gates and follow this along for a short distance then go left at a t-junction.
Now simply follow the sometimes rubbly track all the way down to the pebble beach. In May 2007 when we last walked down there the small beach was well covered with sea flotsam - probably not the best place on Lefkada to spend the afternoon. Simply return back to where the t-junction turn was made near the monastery but this time you can continue straight ahead if you wish and wander round the hillside always bearing and turning right to eventually reach the monastery entrance track.
In fact just before going back to the monastery a little way along the tarmac road (you would have originally passed this on the way to the monastery) there are some nice old wells and ruins to look at - the thing about this whole area is just to pick a bit of it you fancy and go off and wander and enjoy it.

For instance from the wells and before reaching the monastery access track there is a green track going off to the left in front of some old stone barns and buildings. This track wanders off around the hill side for a few kms - it is really scenic with lots of flowers, trees and many butterflies etc.. The track does not actually connect with anywhere - it just comes to a stop so you do have to walk back the same way - but it's a nice stroll.

The Locked Monastery Gates. Whilst around there we noted quite a few cars and some scooters turned up with people obviously wanting to look at themonastery - it is after all signposted from miles away with the brown "ancient site" type signposts - obviously with the locked gates all these potential visitors wasted there time.
However It might be of interest to know that if you care to walk along the green track to the left of the monastery gates (i.e. the track which ultimately goes down to the beach) a little way along if you look carefully the fence has been sadly cut in one place and this has been disguised by a large dead olive tree branch. This branch does however quite happily move out of the way and you can get into the monastery grounds. Not that we would encourage anyone doing this of course even if they have wasted their time and effort to reach the monastery only to find locked gates...

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