The Aegean Sea, white sand like in the Caribbean, and divine peace on the green peninsula. These are the common denominators of Greek Chalkidiki. Just buy cheap flights to Thessaloniki, rent a car at the airport, choose the right “finger,” and endless beach time can begin.
Contents
Day 1 – Town of Toroni
Day 2 – Sarti and beaches on the east coast
Day 3 – Northern beaches
Day 4 – Western coast and its beaches
Day 5 – Farewell to Chalkidiki
Day 1 – Town of Toroni
Chalkidiki consists of three finger-shaped peninsulas – Kassandra, Sithonia, and Athos. An interesting fact is that Athos is an autonomous monastic state where entry is forbidden for women and children. If you still wish to go there, you need to obtain permission six months in advance. The most beautiful beaches are located on the central peninsula of Sithonia, which is the target area of our trip. We chose to stay in the town of Toroni on the south of the island. Through booking.com, we selected Fotini’s Studio 2, which is only a 5-minute walk from the lovely Toroni Beach. Another alternative is to stay in the town of Sarti on the eastern coast, but the beach there is more commercialized. The drive from the airport to Toroni takes approximately 2 hours. Once again, we arranged for a car rental through our trusted aggregator vipcars.com.
TIP: Along the way, there are 3 Lidl stores, with the last one conveniently located in the town of Nikiti.
Parking is free right in front of the apartment, and the accommodation is managed by a very kind lady named Svetlana. We put on our swimsuits, pack a Bluetooth speaker, beer, chips, and our beach picnic can begin. The water in September is pleasantly warm at 23°C and the air temperature reaches up to 30°C. The water clarity is undoubtedly top-notch, and as a bonus, you get to enjoy daily sunsets on this beach. At the end of the coastal strip, there is a ruined castle temporarily closed for reconstruction. It serves as a good running destination in the morning. Regarding nightlife, it’s very quiet here, so be prepared for peaceful evenings where you will be grateful for any open restaurant. Nevertheless, this doesn’t stop us from enjoying a local beer before bed.
Day 2 – Sarti and beaches on the eastern coast
We start the day with a 2.3km run along the Toroni coast. It’s the best way to wake up and you can jump straight into the sea afterwards. Today we have planned to explore the eastern coast around the town of Sarti. The road leads only around the perimeter of the island, so there are no crosswalks available. We start by heading south with our first stop in the port of Porto Koufo, which offers a beautiful panoramic view. Along the way, there are many lookout points, so feel free to stop wherever you like. The first major stop is the Orange Beach, also known as Kavourotripes. A pine forest, round stones reminiscent of the Seychelles, shallow entry into azure waters – that’s how you could describe this beautiful beach. We spread our blanket on that rock of ours and head into the water. You can swim or snorkel near the shore. We even spotted our first jellyfish here, so caution is advised. Around lunchtime, we move back to the car to enjoy our traditional salad and then a bit further down to the Platanitsi Beach. You can only reach it by car by entering the campsite and then walking on foot for about 10 minutes.
TIP: If you can’t make it to the Caribbean, this beach with its beautiful white sand will do just fine 🙂
Moreover, besides being almost alone there, you have a view of the third finger with the fascinating Mount Athos (2030m).
We don’t even want to leave this beach, but we have to. We stop in the town of Sarti for a mega hotdog at Zanzibar bar. In addition to the pleasant service, we also appreciate the view of the azure water. Sarti Beach is a typical town beach with sunbeds and not the cleanest water entrance. So we don’t swim here either and continue back around the island. As world travelers, we know that 3-4 beaches a day is the max if we don’t want to just breeze through them. We add Kalamitsi Beach to the mix. A little craziness at the end of the day doesn’t hurt, so we rent a water bicycle with a slide. We bike to an island, which can be climbed to and reach the top with a flag through a narrow path among the bushes. However, don’t expect anything else there, no view and you might end up scratched. The sun is slowly setting, so it’s high time to pack up and go back to our accommodation. In the evening, we took a walk in our small town and it must be said that if the two restaurants weren’t open, neither was one. We wonder if it’s due to the crisis or because it’s already September.
Day 3 – Northern Beaches
Today we plan to explore the northern part of the peninsula, starting from Orange Beach heading upwards. We begin the morning by preparing our salad, quickly shopping at the supermarket, and putting on our CD in the car. By the way, for every trip, we burn new CDs, and often those songs remind us of past journeys. Our first destination is the Vourvourou area with the Karydi Beach. This beach could be described as idyllic for families with children, as the water is calm and shallow. The bay shaped like the letter U has beautiful round stones at its ends that you can walk along and view the scenery from a different angle. After relaxing in the water, we move on to another “Caribbean” beach, Trani Ammouda.. White sand, a long stretch of beach, and only a few people here and there. We set ourselves up in the shade right at the beginning of the beach, play James Bond music, and take out our salmon salad. Absolutely relaxing. The entry into the water is very gradual and the water is shallow for a long while. We go for a swim and then plan to take an afternoon nap.
TIP: If you want to take nice panoramic shots, you can run up to the nearby green hill.
Our beer can supplies are slowly dwindling, so we stop by Lidl in Nikiti town. We quite enjoy the local hot chocolate. You can get to Nikiti Beach by following various routes as per the navigation. However, it seemed in practice that it was leading us through dirt roads, so one must be cautious. This beach is narrow and didn’t charm us much, so we decide to move on. From the main road, we noticed a small elongated island that wasn’t even on our radar. Closest to it is Kastri Beach, where we park the car, and the adventure towards the rock can begin. The terrain is a bit more challenging to access, so we are alone here and it’s no issue to go into the water in the nude 🙂 My jellyfish luck for this year brought a second jellyfish into my path, fortunately without collision. Definitely don’t come here without diving goggles; the bottom is very shallow, and you have to watch out for sea urchins. Due to this fact, we decided to skip the trip to the island. We drive to the other side of the hill to reach the beach.Agios Loannis Beach. Besides the beautiful beach, you can freshen up at a jungle-themed bar. We enjoy a drink and a coffee, and at the end of the day, one last swim before heading back home to Toroni.
Day 4 – The western coast and its beaches
We wake up to a beautiful sunny morning. As a whole, we must knock on wood because there hasn’t been a cloud in sight throughout our stay. We’re starting right where we left off yesterday, at the Kalogria Beach. In the morning, we are among the first visitors here and we are setting up our things by the round stones. The assumption that there could be a beautiful underwater world here has been fulfilled, and even surprised. Apart from the rocks near the shore, there is a big one about 200m from the shore. It was right here where we experienced the best snorkeling of the whole Sithonia, encountering large schools of fish and a colorful array of different species.
TIP: Kalogria Beach is one of the best snorkeling spots.
You can climb up the rock, but you need to watch out for sea urchins. Beyond the rock, you won’t see the bottom anymore, and the surface plunges into the sea’s depths. When we returned to the shore, someone even caught a starfish. We move on to Lagomandra Beach. The beach is in a hotel resort where it was all about the sunbeds, so we moved a bit around the corner where you have a long coastal strip overlooking the “turtle” island Kelifos.
In the afternoon, we explored the surroundings of Toroni. The Tristinika Beach is easily accessible by car and even before we went for a swim, the stylish Ethnik bar caught our attention. The chairs, the bar, and everything else were painted in the brightest colors. We ordered iced coffee and settled on a comfortable couch overlooking the coast and the azure waters. The perfect scenery was complemented by hills in the distance and green nature. Although it is a long open beach, we saw plenty of small fish near the shore. We postponed lunch a bit today and saved the last portion of salad for later at our accommodation. We needed to recharge before heading to our last point of interest, known as the Hidden Beach. All we knew about it was that it’s a more challenging beach to reach somewhere towards the ruins of a castle. We reached the end of the coastal road and continued uphill on a forest path. We had to stick close to the coast to avoid going too high or too low. The path was slightly overgrown and based on GPS, we decided when to descend. We were a bit disappointed as it wasn’t a sandy beach, just leaves and other forest materials. On the other hand, we were alone and we had some beer 🙂 Eventually, we enjoyed swimming here quite a bit. The seabed was a bit further from the shore, about 3-5 meters deep, and it had a mysterious charm to explore the underwater world when you know you are the only ones there. We returned from the hidden beach just before it got dark, took a shower, and went to find Mrs. Svetlana to settle our accommodation payment. We hadn’t met such kind hosts in a long time; they gave us a bottle of red wine for the road and even wanted to pack some sausages since her husband is a butcher. Unfortunately, our bag ripped along the way, so I guess the wine wasn’t meant for us. We sat down at a little restaurant and to conclude our trip, we treated ourselves to a proper dinner – some had calamari, others had steak.
Day 5 – Farewell to Chalkidiki
In the morning, we still have time for a swim at our beach in Toroni. We savor the Aegean Sea and the amazing natural scenery for one last time. We estimate a 2-hour drive to the airport, so leaving around ten should be sufficient. We have arranged a specific time for returning the car. Everything went smoothly, and the information about the flight delay turned out to be false. We arrive in Budapest around three o’clock. They have opened an aviation museum at the parking lot, so we noted it down for our next visit to this airport.
