Santorini : Windmills, Churches & Santorini Red Beach - Tours and Walks.

Hiking on Santorini visiting Churches, Beaches and Windmills - Red Beach, Kambia Beach, Akrotiri, Kaparies and Moni Taxiarchis.

Perisa - Emborio - 8 windmills - Vlichadha Harbour - Perisa. Walking distance 16kms. This mostly flat Santorini walk takes you out from Perisa to the bottom of the Profitis Ilias hills where you skirt clockwise using an old track and a nice path to get to Emborio. From there it's a walk mostly on a quiet road which climbs gently up going by several old windmills - then something of a scramble down terraces towards Santorini's coast at Vlichadha followed by a walk back along roads and finally by using the beach road into Perisa.

This walk starts off at the northern end of Perisa's Beach by a parking area (this is almost under the hills and next to the ruins of the Byzantine church of Aghia Irini) - follow the road heading inland and staying to the right where the road splits. Pass the Hotel Mariana, continue past the dirt track signed to Ancient Thira and then take the next track on the right.
This track heads directly towards the hills and then bears left around the far side of a house. Now walking along through Santorini's nice countryside follow the dirt track to eventually join a road. Turn right on this road and continue along soon passing the church of Aghios Stefanos. When the road bends very sharply left keep straight ahead by some houses and go onto a sunken Moni-path - when we walked this route the path was fairly overgrown in some places.

The path swings round going past a quarry and then joins a road. Turn left and then shortly go right passing by the front of a church - a path leaves from the far side of the church by a retaining wall. Follow the path with the retaining wall on the right - when the wall starts to turn away continue left across the field to reach a dirt track.

By now you can see a 3-barrelled church which is where you are heading for. Turn right on the dirt track - at a junction go right again and soon passing below the church - it is worth just diverting up to take a closer look at this very interesting building. Having just passed the church the track soon ends at a field - take a Moni-path on the left which heads up between houses and then swings round to the right and takes you to a narrow road. The views of the castle and of Emborio itself are really excellent as you walk along this Moni-path.

Turn left on down the small road and then at a junction go right and then left into the castle - this bit of the walk is ambiguous since you will probably want to look around and could end up anywhere. The aim to continue the walk is to get to Emborio's main bus stop and centre which is by Emborio's church, a large school and play area. From the main bus stop head up the main road going towards Thira until you reach a road junction on the left. The road joining from the left has an immediate fork and you need to take the smaller right hand road which it follows the main Thira road for a little while and then twists away going steeply up and left heading towards the ridge.

There are eight windmills up along the ridge varying in condition from really derelict to not too bad plus one which has been restored - these are really interesting. Having reached the high point the tarmac road ends by a taverna? - it then continues as a dirt track now going straight towards the small church of Profitis Ilias. The track forks in front of the church - take the right hand track which then soon ends by a wall. Climb down the wall on the left and join a small path - this has initially got occasional markings to help show the way - you can now see the harbour at Vlichadha way down below on the right. The aim is to get to this harbour - after a while there is no clear path - you have to make your way down the old field terraces always aiming towards the harbour. As you get further down you will see farm buildings and large greenhouses - aim to get to the right hand side of these green houses where there is also a large sterna.

From here there is now a clear path and then small road which will take you down into Vlichadha where there is a harbour with cafes and tavernas. Around the area you will notice some old buildings with very high chimneys - these used to be tomatoe processing factories - an activity on Santorini which started at the end of the 19th Century. Turn left along the main road - unfortunately you have to use this road for around 2.5kms when a road leaves on the right which heads towards the coast - you can see another large chimney (another ex-processing plant) in the distance. Once down on the coast road just follow it along with the coastline next to you on the right and wander back into Perisa.

Red Beach - Akrotiri - Kaparies - Panaghia - Taxiarchis Monastery - Kambia Beach - Red Beach. Distance 7.8kms.

There is quite a lot of car-parking available at the Santorini Red Beach parking area - if this is full up you can also find a large car park near to the Archaeological Site - which it should be noted at the time of our Santorini holiday was closed for visitors but may well have re-opened by now. From the Red Beach car park walk back up the road to the Archaeological Site car park - at the far end corner of the car park and up the bank you will find the start of a narrow path heading straight ahead with fields on the left and a nice stone wall on the right - this is a bit hard to find because the bank is overgrown with foliage but it is there. Go ahead and soon join a Moni-path - turn right onto this really nice path which goes along the countryside and gives great views of Akrotiri and it's castle. The path goes round the side of a hill and has extremely high rock walls either side - when we walked this there was a considerable amount of undergrowth (some quite thorny) in places which was mixed up sadly in places with general rubbish - no way to treat such a really good path.

The path comes out on a small road, turn right and on reaching the main road turn left and follow this main road up and around to reach the square and bus stop in Akrotiri.
Opposite the bus stop/bus shelter take a narrow road on the left which goes uphill and soon reaches a school where you keep left. Just a little way along you can take steps on the left which lead up into what is left of the castle. Otherwise bear right going past a church to reach a road - here go right and follow it until you reach a hairpin bend where you need to take the alley on the left which continues up hill. A little way up the alley take the first left soon passing a sunken church and village houses - continue on out of the village to reach a road. Go right and soon reach a mini-market on the right - follow the road on round to the left and just after passing some more houses a very rough surfaced concrete track leaves on the right. This goes below a new villa and then continues round the hill-side now thank goodness in the form of a nice path.

The views from here are excellent - you can see everywhere - for instance Oia, Thira, Pirghos and the Monastery - in other words the whole of Santorini's cauldron. The path reaches but does not end at a road but stays as a path for some time just above it. On eventually joining the road you only have to follow it for around 50 yards when you reach a twin church on the left and right next to this steps lead down to Panaghia Kinisi church. This is quite an area - there are several churches here including one just left of Panaghia's entrance gate which is almost built into the rocks. Continue on from the church on a mule-track which goes between fields of grape vines to reach a dirt track.
Turn left then around 80 yards along turn right onto a wide fairly sunken path which goes between more fields and finally arrives at another track. Turn left and now follow this track heading towards Taxiarchis church which is nestled in the hills in front of you.

The church is situated just off to the right of the track - actually it's quite a knee-bender to walk those last few metres up to it. This quite large church almost looks as if once it was used as a monastery - it is very interesting to look round the various parts of it. There is plenty of seating around the church and there is also a well where you can have a nice refreshing splash.

From the church return to the track and turn right - continue along as the route takes you down heading ever closer to the coast and reaches a sort of farm which is situated on a bend. As you walk round the bend there is much higher ground to the right - you can if you wish walk up here and on reaching the top there are suddenly views of the sea and cliffs etc.
Continue along the top on a rough path - this opens up even more cliff views and you can also see small beaches below. The path reverts to a very slippery track just before some rocks - walk back down the left hand fork to get back onto the original track. Continue along and shortly a small church appears ahead of you - however follow the track as it bends

right and soon arrives at Kambia Beach. The beach is extremely stony in places but there are some bits where you can stretch out on a towel and have a sunbathe etc. if you wish - also there is a small taverna on the beach offering drinks and food. Facing the sea turn left and follow the shoreline to go round an outcrop and then arrive at another quite scruffy beach - you can now see Santorini's famous Red Beach in the distance. When we did this walk the shoreline was covered with thick layers of seaweed - it did not look too inviting to stay around on.

At the far end of the beach you have to scramble up about 2 metres or so of loose rock and shingle to reach a narrow path - turn right and follow it on round the hill. Vertigo Note: I dislike some heights and I did not at all take to the first 20 metres of this path as there was a big drop down on the right - I therefore scrambled on up the hillside for another 2 to 3 metres where there is another parallel path which is wider and better to walk as the drops were not so apparent. Whichever path you chose they both meet a little way round the hillside and then just continue along to quite soon arrive at Santorini's famous Red Beach. This part of Red Beach is mentioned as a popular place for naturists but we did not see anyone stripped off. Walk on across this black, white but mostly red shingle beach with it's impressive overhanging but badly crumbling red-coloured cliffs (in fact in some places the cliffs are now coloured white as erosion has collapsed the red rock layer). There are beach chairs and so on available towards the far end of the beach but we could not see any drinks or food facilities on it. At the far end of the beach just walk on up and over the rocks and then shortly arrive back at the Red Beach car-park.

Please visit our Santorini Holiday Guides for lots more about the island.