Skiathos Holiday Travel Beach Walks Photo Guide Holidays Skiathos Greece

Getting 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 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 the airport can only handle at the most 3 aircraft at a time this can be pretty congested too.

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 brocken 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.

Our Skiathos Topics

You may be interested in our Home Page which has holiday, travel and walks information about around 16 other Greek Islands and similar guides for The Canary Islands of Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and Lanzarote.

Travel and Holiday Guide for the Greek Island Of Skiathos.

Our Skiathos Greece Travel, Holiday, Beach, Walks and Photos Guides are full of information about the various things you can do and see whilst on your holidays.

The following pages are based around our holiday on Skiathos during July 2007 - therefore where prices and bus times and so on are mentioned these apply to this period and obviously may change especially the "prices".