Walking in the Peloponnese

Southern Peloponnese, 3rd ed (2019), updated 23/05/2024

Updates for walks and car tours (drives) in Southern Peloponnese given below supplement those provided in the guidebook. It is vital that this Update is read in conjunction with the text of the book, but note that the Update applies only to the edition stated and not to any earlier editions. (If you have an older edition of this book you can “upgrade” to the latest edition at half price.)

Information has been forwarded to us by users of the book, and Sunflower Books offers the data in good faith but cannot be held responsible for any misleading or inaccurate content in the Update. Unless indicated otherwise, what appears here has not been verified by the author or publisher, so please allow due caution when new or amended routes are suggested. Each piece of information is dated; bear in mind that some of the older observations may have since been overtaken by events or further changes. If, during your holiday, you are using the current edition of the guide and are able to provide any additional updating to add to this page, we will be pleased to hear from you. Please send information, preferably by e-mail, to info@sunflowerbooks.co.uk.

General: I would make it clear in the introductory text to the book that it is very easy to get taxis. We were a bit hesitant – but even people who didn’t speak English understood exactly what we wanted. (User, 8/19)

Walk 1: Had a little difficulty early on (5 mins to 23 mins in the guide). 5 mins:  there is another concrete track which descends to a concrete block building just before the one which must be followed.  It soon becomes obvious that there is no onward route, so not a big problem.  Would help to add “just as the road turns sharp left” after “big church on your right”… After this we then got lost following the dirt track. We found our way up to the road by turning left up a track, the left hand side of which was crumbling away, and then turning right onto a jeep track. (User 5/23)

Walk 6: lots of new roofs in Pigadia and money spent on redoing the church. (User, 9/20) +A good walk.  We walked down the gorge from Pigadiotiko Bridge to Profitis Ilias.  Many of the boulders with iron rungs and hoops have been moved by the winter water flow in the gorge (according to a local) and the rungs are now not in positions where they are much use! Also walking up the gorge would be much easier than walking down.  The red dots marking the best route are generally more visible walking up. (User, 6/22) • Shorter walk: We thought this was a good choice for a very hot sunny day, as when we did it between 8am and 11am on July 8, most of this walk was in shade. It was coming into full sun as we left. (User, 7/23)

Walk 7: A wonderful walk. Just a few comments: (2h50min) We couldn’t see the waymarks. “…then keep left..”: Ignore the first fork left (with a fence) and take the next one (there is only a green spot).
The detour 4: You will have to run if you wish to do it within 35 minutes. Allow 50 min. (User 10/22)

Walk 8: The 15 minute-point instruction could also apply to another path, just before the right fork. This one involves a 90 degree turn right, not a fork, and has a dry stone wall on the right. It soon gets overgrow. Perhaps add “Soon after the path opens out giving access to olive groves on the right” after “following a ditch” in the previous sentence. (User, 5/23)

Walk 12: This was absolutely lovely, and the instructions were perfect. Only one comment: the start of the walk is hard to find, the red waymarks are almost completely hidden by vegetation. Worth noting, perhaps. You could also say that the path is between the long house which is mentioned in the text and a short uphill driveway leading to another house. We walked back and forth a couple of times before spotting the way marks. (User, 8/19)

Walk 14a: This walk was indeed very overgrown in the second half (walked on July 5). It is not a walk for anyone with arachnophobia, as there was a steady supply of webs with very active spiders at head height for most of the second half of the walk (i.e. the last 20 minutes going out and the last 20 minutes returning). The cicadas being pursued regularly squirted on our heads too! We usually walk at roughly the pace given in the book but thought 40 minutes was optimistic for this walk (although that could be due to ducking to avoid all the spider webs). The chapel was closed. (User, 7/23) • We never found our way up to Pepon as it was really overgrown, and the way down from Leontakis looked just as bad. So we failed completely. Also, the bit that we did manage, we were using our sticks as flails to try and get through the millions of spider webs and massive spiders, some of them almost as big as Shelob from the Hobbit!! (User,5/24)

Walk 15: On page 97: walkers should go straight ahead after passing through the broken down wall referred to, rather than following the (currently clearer) path across the gully. Returning from Leontakis, walkers should go left/ south below the graveyard to locate the well-constructed stone stepped path back. Hope that clarifies the route for Spring walkers, when it’s a bit overgrown. (User, 2/20) + A 100m section of the path to Pépon below Liontaki – at least as marked by the now fading red paint waymarks – is  overgrown by thorny bushes and impassable. (So much so that someone has written on the sign to Πεπο at the junction of gullies that the “route is hard to follow, take other fork”). We may have misunderstood your directions but became stuck on the north bank in the bushes following the red paint waymarks. If anyone else does, they should ignore the waymarks leading them into the thorn bushes and cross the stream bed to the south side and follow a thin path along a wall running parallel to the stream bed for 100m before it crosses back to the north side and picks up the red paint waymarks and heads up to Pépon. PS The villages are becoming repopulated and a lot of rebuilding is going on – the two higher villages had cars parked in them – even Pépon had a truck. (User, 9/20) [The author comments: “Those thorny bushes grow fast (goats don’t graze them). I don’t imagine anyone is pruning the path back in spring, as I (and others locally) occasionally used to. It’s 2 years since I walked that route. An alternative is of course to walk up to Leontaki and back the same way.”

Walk 19: We started at Parori where the path rejoins the tarmac. There is a sign saying “ATTENTION, danger of landslides, no entry”. 100m in, there has indeed been a massive landslide right across the path where cliff has collapsed. This might be passable with care, and it looks as though some people have,  but we weren’t well enough shod. Presumably there is a similar warning sign above the gorge too. See photos below. (User, 5/24)

Walk 25: A good walk! There is an easier circular alternative walk.  There is a map beside the road (on a bend near to where the alternative walk leaves the road) showing a number of walks in the area.  The alternative proposed in the guide is labelled X4.  The easier shorter alternative is X5. It leaves the road at the same place as the walk in the guide, but diverges to the right after 25/25 minutes and generally contours northwards around the base of the cliff, delightfully overlooking Kiparissi for most of the way, before going over a low pass above Palaia Hora and then dropping down to Aghia Varvara to rejoin the main route back to Kiparissi.  It is reasonably well marked with red dots and some metal plates with X5 on a red background and route finding is not much of a problem.  There appeared to have been some path maintenance in the first part of the path (cutting back overhanging branches and the like) this year. Someone else we met in Kiparissi walked it the opposite (anti clockwise) direction and they had no problems either. There is also a good short walk (30min each way) from Paralia around the south side of the bay to Aghios Georgios, marked as X6 on the map, with swimming possibility at the end. Also the coast road from Poulithra to Kiparissi has now been completed, but the most dramatic arrival in Kiparissi is still from the south. (User, 6/22)