A visit to Kallithea on Kassandra

Kallithea is the most touristic place on the Kassandra peninsula but still has a pleasant atmosphere. The center actually consists only of restaurants, bars and souvenir shops and this is the place where we are going to buy souvenirs and presents because it is not too expensive either, compared with other parts of the country. Last year we already discovered that and now use that knowledge. Now it is still fairly quiet but in the holiday season and the weekends it is full of tourists and Greeks from Thessaloniki.

There are also some cultural things to see such as the Ammon-Zeus temple (we saw it 2 years ago) but we now go inside the St. Nicholas church. It is only a small church but the icons and paintings are beautiful. There are many such small churches in Greece and so far we have mostly skipped them. This year we go inside a bit more often.
Wo never paid much attention to it, but now I realize that with all those thousands of churches, we never actually saw that a church service was in progress.

The village lies high on the rocks above the sea and there is a long boulevard with many hotels and nightclubs at the ends; if you come for the nightlife this is the place to be. We feel a little too old for that and prefer to stroll through the parks and shops that are there.

Today we limit ourselves to Kallithea (which means 'beautiful view') but there are plenty of other and nicer places on this peninsula. Two years ago we drove around for 2 days here, just like on the next peninsula, Sithonia. Now we make a walk, buy souvenirs and of course, sit down at a terrace to have a coffee.

Teije is reading his homework, a story in an old fairy tale book, when a girl comes to take our order. Oh, she says, in Greek, where did you get that book? I also used to have that at school. And so Teije can practice his language skills again. I do not understand it at all what they are saying and he tells me the whole conversation later. Well, I must believe him on his word but it sounded pretty nice. But I would have preferred her to bring the coffee instead of just talking!

Virtually all souvenir shops have bathing items such as inflatable swans, swimming rings, balls and mats and such a mat is exactly what I am looking for, that is better to lie on, on the beach. And inside the shops there is often a large variety of souvenirs and the assortment varies considerably from store to store. We work our entire list: what do we take with us for the children and the grandchildren and for a few friends? After an hour of shopping we are done, so we do not have to shop anymore for the rest of the holiday. Although, it remains nice to occasionally browse around in such shops looking for something special.

On our way to our beach we drive near Olynthos a bit through the area. We have already seen the extensive excavation of ancient Olynthus, but there are many more ancient remains to be found in the area, although the 14th century tower of Mariana is a bit lost in the landscape, just like the ruins of the Nikolaos church from the 12th century. In the area around the church, an awful lot of objects from Byzantine times was found. Well, the soil of the whole of Greece will still be full of old objects. We better bring a spade next time.

Of course we also go to the beach every afternoon for a while and in the evening we sit on our balcony, downstairs with Michael and Kiki or visit a restaurant. On the last evening in Paralia Dionysiou we go with a whole group of Greeks and Russians to a traditional Greek music evening at a restaurant. This area is very popular with Russians and people from the former Eastern bloc. According to some, because it would be much cheaper here, but the Russians we know are not really poor when you see what kind of cars they drive. One of the Russians we know has even bought a house here because of the pleasant climate.