Development of the northern part of mainland Greece

Written: 10 august 2009
Travel time: 19 — 31 july 2009
Your rating of this hotel:
1.0
from 10
Hotel ratings by criteria:
Rooms: 2.0
Service: 2.0
Cleanliness: 1.0
Food: 2.0
Amenities: 2.0
It's time to choose a venue for our vacation with my husband from 19.07. 09 to 31.07. 09, the criteria were as follows:
- Well-known tour operator
- Inexpensive (relatively), with an acceptable level of quality
- Convenient transport accessibility for sightseeing
- The territory of the hotel for evening walks
- Nearby village
After reading the reviews, we realized that it is better not to choose a hotel less than 4 * (not friendly attitude, service, poor food, ) Therefore, our choice fell on the OLYMPIAN BAY hotel provided to us by Mouzenidis Travel - the largest tour operator on the Greek mainland. The village (town) Leptokarya is about 2-3 km, 26 km from Katerini, 30 km from Paralia Katerini, 120 km from Macedonia airport and 110 Thessaloniki. The cost for 13 days was 81.000 rubles for two. HB meals were taken deliberately (although the most common system in the hotel is All inclusive). The hotel itself is located a short distance from the city.

. Leptokarya (15 min. walk to the bottom), this is its plus for those who are looking for peace and tranquility, away from the hustle and bustle, the only thing that sometimes violated it was the signals of joyful trains passing by, but this was rare and did not spoil the rest , ) Based on the reviews about the strange bathrooms in the main building, the small elevator (2 elevators are really small, like in a panel 9 floors), general air conditioning, noisiness and smell of bleach from the pool, those rooms whose windows overlooked the sea, we we chose a bungalow with its own air conditioning, but the truth is that there is no view from the balcony, because the view opens to the front entrances to the bungalow (but not to the windows) and the lawn between the buildings. Bungalows are located in two-story buildings and stand in orderly rows one after another from the sea to the roadway. The contingent is 1/4 ours, the rest are mainly Germans, Poles, Bulgarians and Greeks of different ages.
The room is clean, well-groomed, there is a small LCD TV (of the Russian channels, only ORT, which did not always work, probably, communication problems), a cool balcony, behind a full-wall glass sliding door, there are many lighting points, but, as is customary with us, there is no central ceiling lamp, ) the presence of a safe (it can be activated at the reception for 2 euros per day), a personal air conditioner, a mini-fridge (was empty, i. e. without a mini-bar), a bathroom, tiles on the floor, two large beds pushed together. They cleaned and changed towels and sheets every day (sheets - not every day), but the soap items were changed only a couple of times, I even wanted to stop leaving tips.
Particularly “pleasant” were power outages (once for several hours - they lost electricity during the day) and water cuts (a couple of times for an hour it was neither cold nor hot, and sometimes only cold, this is especially “pleasant” in the evening). There were no problems of mutual understanding, because there is always someone in the hotel who speaks Russian or English. The territory of the hotel itself is fenced, large and well-groomed (flowers, hills, bushes and trees, bridges over artificial reservoirs) and surrounded by a metal fence. On the territory of the hotel there are several restaurants, a shop with everything you need, but at inflated prices, - an Internet “cafe” with slot machines, car rental, a jewelry store, a playground, 3 bars in the hotel lobby: near the pool and on the beach.
There are several pools and they are very beautifully designed - in a cascade from large to small for kids and from small to the lower tier, and then even longer (they never swam in it, they didn’t want to interfere with the Poles and Germans enjoying chlorinated water, )) And also there is a court for b. tennis (paid) and ping pong (free). In the evenings, children's animation and a disco at 23-30 on the beach at the bar (paid), sometimes animation for adults took place, but we never visited them, we had something to do, ) Food - buffet. For breakfast, the choice of food was always the same - scrambled eggs, omelettes, sausages, sliced ​ ​ ​ ​ sausage and cheese, yoghurts, cereals, canned fruits and various jams, tea, coffee. For dinner, the food is more varied (fish, meat, salads, soup, pasta, vegetables, desserts, fruits, ice cream), but 80 percent of the dishes remained the same. Drinks at dinner are paid, except for tea and a glass of water (it looks like from the tap).

There were few fruits, mostly watermelon. We had half board - breakfast and dinner. Once they changed dinner for lunch (this is possible), the assortment of food at lunch is very similar to dinner. We also periodically bought groceries in supermarkets and occasionally dined in restaurants.
I liked it very much from drinks: mythos beer, ouzo (aniseed vodka), metaha brandy, from dishes: only all seafood, fish, moussaka, ice cream, euro, you can get to the final (upper part of Leptokarya), the main street is pedestrian and similar to our Arbat, souvenir shops, cafes and shops, supermarkets are scattered on different sides, so souvenirs and products were purchased mainly there, ) There is also a railway station from which trains run to Athens, Katerini, Thessaloniki ...The crystal and moderately warm sea opened its arms and accepted us as its own, the first days there were waves on which we swayed with pleasure, then we enjoyed its calmness and majesty, ) At the entrance to the sea there is a small a strip of pebbles, and then sand again!
The air temperature throughout the rest was in the range of 30-37, ), there was almost always a light breeze on the beach and the heat was not felt, unlike places more distant from the sea. The beach is clean sandy (municipal), two sunbeds, an umbrella and a table cost 7 euros (sunbeds by the pool are free), I recommend taking beach towels with you for hygiene reasons (it is not customary to take bath towels out of the hotel). Many, in order not to spend 7 euros a day, bought mats and umbrellas in stores and settled down on their own. And also on the beach you can take advantage of the mass of water activities: diving, riding a banana, catamaran, canoe. The beach next to our hotel was relatively free, only on weekends there were a lot of people on the beach - the Greeks came to rest. But in the towns in which we also visited - Leptokaria and Paralia Katerinis, the beaches are crowded even on weekdays, everything is strewn with the bodies of vacationers.
Naturally, the representative of Mouzenidis will offer you to attend excursions (keep in mind that there were not so many people in our hotel and therefore we were brought to the tourist double-decker bus, which started its route from Halkidiki and as a result we could not always find places next to each other). We took 2 excursions to Meteora and Aridea + Edessa, and also wished to participate in the Greek evening, which takes place in this hotel on Fridays and costs 15 euros per person. An ensemble of Greek dancers, dressed in national costumes, performed national dances and tricks to live national music performed by a guitarist and a guitarist-singer.

We watched all this while having dinner at our table and sipping Greek wine, but they didn’t let us get bored for a long time, periodically pulled us out of the tables and introduced us to learning the local dance - sirtaki, ) The next day we went to Meteora - one of the main attractions Greece - these are monasteries built by hermit monks in the 15th century. on tall rocks, the beauty is indescribable - it is better to see them once! Keep in mind in the area where Meteora is located in July it is very hot, our temperature reached 43 degrees in the shade by 3 pm, so be sure to stock up on thermal water, drinking water, scarves, fans, creams, hats and everything that can help overcome this temperature. ) On the way to Meteora, we were brought to an icon-painting workshop-shop and had a lecture on how to make them.
We liked the Icon of the Mother of God, which is called “Staritsa”, this is a miraculous icon from Athos and is the only icon there, on which the Mother of God is depicted in full growth. A large number of miracles are associated with her, she patronizes people engaged in mental work, she heals serious ailments, and also helps women to have offspring and get rid of infertility! The icon is made of silver, gold leaf and inlaid with Swarovski stones - just a miracle! I felt a relationship with her and we bought it, but not in this store, where it cost 200 euros, although it seemed to be given for 100, and in Paralia for 60 euros, in Leptokarya it cost 130 euros. A couple of days later we went on an excursion to Aridea + Edessa. First we stopped in the city of Edessa, where we enjoyed the views of the waterfalls and made wishes in a centuries-old plane tree, ). G.
Loutraki - waterfalls, a dizzying gorge, and all this in the middle of the forest, through which the river Thermopotamos (warm river) flows. Mud baths, healing springs, which consist of the entire periodic table and will cure any disease! ))) (I checked it myself, my allergy was gone! ) There are several pools with thermal water, large (artificial) and small (created by nature) for 4 and 2 euros, respectively, there are also very small natural pools and puddles for free. Then my husband and I decided to rent a car (in a hotel). The choice of cars is not very large - mostly small cars Matiz, Fiats, Nissan Micra, Citroen C3, etc. All cars are air-conditioned. There are very few cars with automatic transmission and you need to sign up for them in advance. We got a 1.4-liter Ford Focus with mechanics (perhaps the most powerful car of all that was there), we took it for two days, the price is 60 euros per day, plus 5 euros for a second driver.
Normal 95 gasoline costs about 1 euro per liter. According to the rental conditions, if you rent a car for only one day, then the mileage limit is 200 km, for two days there is no such restriction.

In two days we drove over 600 km and visited: the city of Dion, the city of Litohoro, the city of Leptokarya, the city of Katerini, the city of Paralia, the city of Thessaloniki (with parking in Thessaloniki it’s quite a disaster), we visited the Kassandra peninsula in Halkidiki, ) and even tried to climb Mount Olympus (2917 m) - by car it is possible to climb only 1100 m (the road is a cool narrow serpentine), to the entrance to the national park, then on foot to different heights, but this is not for everybody)). We walked a bit in the mountain park and drove back. On the last day, the sea, in parting, suddenly showed its monsters and we shied away from small blue and large dark blue jellyfish, ))))))
To summarize: Greece is a paradise where you can forget about the bustle and enjoy the serenity and leisurely Greeks, who are ready to share their friendly sea, sun, dazzling nature, and touch priceless sights! This is the place where you want to return, because there are so many unknown things left: Athens, the Peloponnese and the islands, ))))))
Translated automatically from Russian. View original