Thank you so much for all the useful info, Tsipouro! This really helps me a lot with planning our trip. We are planning our trip for next year May/June, but I always start early so as to get a lot of info and tips from people who have already been there. The best thing I've done so far, is to join TA!
We love walking, do it for at least 2hrs every day, done part of the Camino in 2008, and loved it. So we will definitely do the walk from Zachlorou to Diakofto. Thanks again for that info.
I have started reading all your posts on Greece and there is a wealth of tips and info which we can use.
We plan to fly from London (where our son lives) to Athens, get our car there, drive to Nafplio where we will stay for a few days, from where we will take day trips to Hydra and Spetses, then to Monemvasia and Gythio, through the Mani and then Diakofto and Kalavryta.
Then towards Ioanninna and see the clifftop Monasteries and Zagoria, then on towards Thessaloniki.
We are not pressed for time, so we are planning our trip for about 3 weeks all in all.
If we have enough time, we would like to cross the boarder into Macedonia (FYROM) for a few days, but we do not know yet if we need a visa for that. Somebody said we can go in with our Schengen if we stay for not more than 9 days. We do not have a Macedonian Consulate in South Africa.
I will still have a lot of questions, so please bear with me.
Thanks for now, more questions will follow as the planning progresses!
Annali