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Gregale

Mountains & gorges

Greece is the third most mountainous country in Europe. The Pindus runs the length of the mainland, Olympus tops 2,900 metres, and the gorges of Zagori and Crete are among the deepest on the continent.

Arched stone bridge over a river in a deep green gorge

About Mountains & gorges

This is the Greece that stays green and cool while the islands bake, and it is where the food, the architecture and the hospitality tradition are strongest — mountain villages had to be self-sufficient, and it shows in the kitchens.

The walking is exceptional and under-used: waymarked mule paths, kalderimia paved in the eighteenth century, hut-to-hut routes on Olympus and through the Pindus, and gorge floors that take a full day end to end. None of it requires technical skill, most of it requires a guide who knows the water sources.

Spring, when the wildflowers are up and the rivers are full, and October, when the beech and chestnut turn, are the two best windows. Summer works at altitude; August in a Zagori village is around ten degrees cooler than Athens.

Where it is at its best

  • The Vikos gorge floor

    Zagori

    Six hours, nine hundred metres of wall above you, and a spring at the far end.

  • Samaria

    Crete

    Sixteen kilometres down to the Libyan Sea, May to October only.

  • Mount Olympus in stages

    Thessaly

    Litochoro to the refuge and up, over two or three days.

  • The kalderimia of Pelion

    Magnesia

    Cobbled paths from ridge villages down through chestnut forest to the sea.

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