Travelling to Skiathos. Many people from Northern Europe heading to Skiathos on holiday fly in on charter aircraft - the flight time from Gatwick England for instance is around 3.5 hours. The airport facilities on the island are quite limited - something you certainly notice when leaving since the queues of holidaymakers waiting to go through the various luggage scanners can be horrendous - they only have two scanners and everything has to be checked. The departure area only has perhaps enough seating for several 100 people at best and since Skiathos airport can only handle at the most 3 aircraft at a time this can be pretty congested too.
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Anyway back on the best bit which is getting and going there for your holiday,
the landing experience is quite something - aircraft have to really slam on the
anchors and use every inch of the small runway otherwise it's wet feet. Once through the usually quick passport control you are then shipped off by coach to your holiday accommodation. However it might be worth checking out the option of making your own way to your apartment rather than using the holiday company transit. We booked on the web and got the option to remove or pick various options. We always remove the hot meal since it is in our view expensive and rubbish on holiday charter flights - better just to take some nice crusty rolls or similar. Another option we had was to remove the transit coach - at UK Pounds 7.50 each way i.e. UK GPB30 for the two of us we removed this and instead just got a taxi. Skaithos is a small island with most accommodation close to the main coast road - our taxi was 15 Euros which got us to Troulos Bay - no doddering about on the coach for ages - we were there in 15 minutes. On departure you need to remember to book a taxi at least the day before leaving since on "fly days" they are often heavily booked and thus hard to find. The above is a nice relaxed way to start your holiday in Skiathos and you save quite a bit of money too. |
Getting Around. There is an excellent bus service
which runs along the coast road between Skiathos Town and the far end of
Koukonaries/Banana Beach - these buses start quite early in the morning and
finish around 0100hrs with usually a bus every 20 minutes. They do get packed
with typically busiest times Skiathos Town to Koukonaries between 10:00 and
11:30 and Koukonaries to Skiathos Town 17:00 hours through to 20:30hrs (the
latter are people leaving the beaches plus others heading into Town for the
evening). There is also a limited mini-bus service from Skaithos Town which goes
up to the Monastery - we think this leaves at 10:15 most days but you need to check this further.
Taxis ply their trade along the main road often driving just
ahead of the buses as they try to get customers waiting at the bus stops - the
fare is around 10 Euros but agree it first if you use a taxi. The taxi drivers
will try to get as many other passengers in as they can (stopping at other bus
stops on the way) and you have to be a little firm about this - if necessary
tell them you will just get out again else you might find 6 or 7 of you packed inside.
Car, Jeep and Scooter Hire and the Roads and Tracks. The
main tarmac road on the Island runs from the airport to Koukonaries - the main
hazard are the taxis who seem to drive like maniacs at times but generally
driving is ok. There are very well graded tracks which run round (and across)
the island from Koukonaries through to the main beaches on the less populated
parts like the lovely Mandraki Beach etc. - these are perfectly fine for cars to
use as well as scooters. Lots of people do seem to hire the far more expensive
jeeps as well (safari experience... certainly a very dusty experience..?) but
with one exception the track surfaces are flatter and generally better than we
find on our English roads around Oxfordshire - few potholes and broken
surfaces- therefore cars are a lot more comfortable and of course you can leave
things in a car out of sight in the boot. The one exception is the last couple
of kilometres down to Kastro - this track is driveable by car but is pretty
rough in places. In July we had a Saxo for one day which was 30 Euros with all
insurances - we were also told a scooter would be around 10 Euros a day (many
holiday insurances do not cover any accidents on scooters we believe so think on
that before hiring a scooter). We understood jeeps to be around 45 Euros a day -
whichever you chose we found that the hire companies were willing to negotiate a
price especially where payment was in good old cash.
Beaches. Skiathos has gorgeous beaches - there are lots of
small coves and large sandy beaches on the Troulos/Koukonaries side of the
island and several huge sandy beaches like Mandraki on the other side - the
latter being far quieter than the beaches along the main road. Banana beach is
obviously well known for it's nudist beach but in truth the nudist area on the
beach is not too big and gets packed - much better are beaches like Mandraki
where you can strip off for a nude swim and sunbathe if you so wish - but there
are also sun beds and lots of room for conventional sunbathing. We have created
a page of photos and a little about some of Skiathos's beaches which is located here.
Food and Drink. The food and choice on offer on Skiathos we found to be excellent - with well cooked and presented main courses varying from lamb, beef, pork and veal through to various fish choices. The main courses were huge and we soon gave up thinking of having any starters though the temptation - although we were pretty full up - to have a nice Greek yoghurt with a good lashing of wild honey or similar proved a little irresistible at times. The house reds and whites were very drinkable too - note we mainly used various tavernas along the main road areas outside of Skiathos Town - in the Town prices especially on the front were quite a lot higher and in our view not nearly as good value. Typically a main meal plus sweet and then a jug of house red cost us about 30 Euros (expect to get your jug re-filled and maybe an ouzo or two as a gift as well especially on subsequent visits.)
Walking. There are not a lot of paths on the Island - we did as usual do a lot of hiking on Skaithos but this was mainly on the tracks up in the mountains and hills - although hot out there the lovely forests and often cool sea breezes did make walking really enjoyable and because of the amount of tracks you can easily make circular walks from anything of 4 or 5 kms to 20kms. We have a variety of walking ides which can be found via this menu page.
Hazards. Two problems spring to mind - one of them being the
infernal wasps. These quite small insects were all over the island and were a
real nuisance during daylight hours - we were told that this year was
particularly bad. Open a can of Fanta or eat some fruit and they were at times
really onto you - and the sting from them is particularly painful with real pain
for several hours and then on and off pain for several days unless you get the sting out quickly.
The other hazard and one we were eventually extremely close to (Troulos Bay area)
was forest fires
- the rubbish tip caught light and eventually a 5km stretch of the island was
ablaze. As the fire spread we could see huge flames and the smoke was horrendous
- at times and over a period of more than 12 hours 3 helicopters and 6 sea
planes at a time where dropping water onto the fire and people were having to be evacuated from the area.
All over the hills and mountains are signs asking people
not to smoke yet the next day following the fire and whilst we
were walking on another part of the Island near Mandraki a jeep went by on the
track and out was thrown a still alight cigarette butt - so stupid. Even
casually thrown glass beer bottles etc are a real hazard and can easily set off
a fire. There are several photos of the fire above and having been so close to
this (as well as one on Samos a few years ago) quite simply
please be fire conscious and think whilst out on any of the Greek Island's lovely
but very vulnerable forests.
Kastro is sat on a high cliff which protrudes out over the sea and is a
natural fortress - it's located at the high northern part of Skiathos. It was originally
settled during the 14th Century because of the threat from pirates on the lower
coastal part of the island.
Initially under the control of the Byzantine empire
it was also occupied by the Venetians and then the Turks, then the Venetians
again until the Greek State was formed. The town was also protected
itself by the use of a drawbridge the remains of which can still be seen -
eventually Kastro was abandoned around 1830.
There are still many ruins scattered around
the hillside showing that the population at one time must have been quite
large. There were also a lot of churches in Kastro and several of these have now
been restored with more slowly being sorted out as money permits.
There are two ways to reach Kastro - daily excursion boats leave Skiathos and
visit Kastro as part of their itinerary. Note that the boats leave you on the
small pebble beach (which has a small seasonal taverna) and you then have a considerable climb up a twisty steep path
to reach the town itself which can easily take 20 to 30 minutes. In July
and August you also need to take account of the high temperatures which makes stiff climbs twice as difficult.
The other way to the Kastro is via road - well it's mostly track in fact and
when we went to Kastro in July 2007 we did so reasonably easily by car. The most
direct way is to use the road leaving the coastal road at Bus Stop 9 - this
heads north almost directly towards Kastro via Aghios Konstantinos. The last 1.2 kilometres of track which
descend into the parking area near Kastro are in quite a rugged state - if using
a small car when you return you need to just probably get into first gear and
simply keep the car going - any hesitation and you may get stuck on the loose surface.
The last several 100 metres from the parking area are by a wide rocky footpath - remember to take a bottle of water with you when heading into Kastro itself since it always seems to be incredibly hot there.
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| Path to Kastro Gate | Kastro | Kastro Coastline | Cape Kastro |
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| Kastro | Kastro Beach | Beach and Coastline Kastro | Kastro Drawbridge Ruins |
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| Kastro Gate | Inside Aghia Marina | Aghia Marina | Aghios Nikolaos |
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| Aghios Nikolaos church | Christos | Christos Courtyard | Christos Courtyard |
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| inside Christos - Kastro | Church ruins | semi ruined church | Kastro Traditional House |
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| Kastro Traditional House | Kastro Traditional House | Kastro Traditional House | Ruins |
Our Skiathos Topics
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Other Resources
Skiathos by Greeka
Skiathos Greece Travel Guide from Greek Island Postcards
Walking the
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