Click here to download our day 5 itinerary, photos and points of interest as *.kmz for Google Earth.
The day started with the breakfast at the peaceful inner courtyard of Hotel Mavrokordatiko – breakfast is acceptable, coffee is unfortunately below any standards.
After taking some pictures outside the hotel (there are two old wells that have obviously been run in an “automated” mode driven by humans or donkeys running in circles – very interesting), we visited an old monastery named “Ayios Ioannis” very close to the hotel.
We just followed a Chios monument road sign to find this place. We tried to get more information about what it was and if it is still in use however even locals do not have so helpful ideas. Google is useless as well, as there are I think so many “Ayios Ioannis” monastries all around Greece. Looking like abandoned in the middle of nowhere, the supposedly monastry still shows signs of nice Byzantine architectural style and worths a stop if you are around.
On Chios there are not many helpful direction signs – if they exist, the names do not necessarily match the ones on our map, most of the supposedly relevant signs are written only in Greek Letters, so you need to refresh your Maths knowledge before the trip …
Continuing the trip to Vessa through the hills of southern Chios – Vessa is a little village with a cute old center, with many nicely renovated medieval houses and churches. Definitely worth a walk around. The village seems to look a bit ugly from a distance from the hills, but that’s not the case at all in reality. Surprisingly it did not get as famous as Mastichohorias like Mesta, Pyrgi or Olimbi however has even more to offer in terms of naturality.
It is advisable to take a snack at Kostas´ snackbar opposite of the central Taverna at the entrance of the village. For those who are really hungry, the central taverna also seemed promising but we prefered to quickly have our Pita Gyros and relax under the hundred year old trees.
Passing by the little harbour village Aya Irini, we discovered a coastal road leading north, might lead to Lithi, which was not present in our map – It looked potentially interesting with stunning views over the bay. We could not go further as we wanted to still visit Mastichohorias and have a swim.
Coastal road between Aya Irini to Limenas offers great views to the sea and has two nice small non-commercial beaches, one being Dhidhymia beach. The beach had no facilities as seen from above but looked very inviting.
Finally we arrive at the most famous of ancient Mastichohorias – Mesta. Mesta is a must : Take a walk though the great old city center! Stop at the central Kafenion opposite the central church for a refreshing frappe, surprising but true- you will also get free wireless internet connection there! Unfortunately the village deservedly became a bit over-touristy with so many souvenir shops, but still gives one the feeling of years ago while strolling in the narrow medieval – mostly death-end streets.
Next stop is Olimbi – similar to Mesta, a bit less beautiful according to us. Enjoy a stroll and stop for a coffee at one of the Kafenions.
Pirgi is another medieval Mastichohoria Village full of houses with a typical decoration called xysta. Xysta is mainly geometric shapes done by black or colorful volcanic stones on white background. Another aspect that made Pyrgi even more colorful was the sun-bathing tomotoes on the walls. Still, our favorite stays as Mesta.
Looking for a beach to relax and take a bath, we saw the sign to the “Fana beach”. The beach looked like a secluded little and non-touristy beach, mainly thanks to the non-paved dirt road to reach there. However, there are no facilities (no sunbeds, umbrellas, shower or a tavern/snack bar) there so we decided to find a more civilized one for that afternoon. On the way to “Fana” beach, we took a walk to the “Sanctuary of Apollo Phanaios“
, which is apperantly an ancient site with a cute little chapel. Many of the ancient stones around the chapel / church reminded us of those used to build the ancient city walls of Assos in North-west Turkey.
We finally made a short stop at Komi beach to take a swim. Beach is sandy, but the place is very commercial / touristic. LIke all the over-toursity places, the quality of the service at the restaurants and cafes around was drastically lower than other parts of the island.
Continuing to our Hotel at Kambos, we took the dinner in Katarraktis at Restaurant Tsampoi ( Phone +30 22710 61436 ). We had very delicious fresh sea food for quite low prices (Euro 25 for two Persons), directly at the harbor with view on the fishing boats. Katarraktis – once it is dark – becomes a quite and picturesque fishing village with mostly locals/Greek people eating at the Tavernas and cats and dogs trying to get some share from their plates.
Final Tips:
- Clicking on one of our photos above will open a bigger version of it in a new browser window.
- Click here for an overview of our trip “Greek islands 2008″
- In case you have a question, just leave a comment on this article!
