Cruising The Med - Sandy and Rob's Excellent Adventure: Trip to Paleokastritsa

On the North East side of Corfu lies PaleoKastritsa, (Pronounced ' Paleokastreetsa') one of the most highly recommended places to visit while on Corfu.

To get there, we sped along roads across the island from Gouvia with really lovely views until we arrived at PaleoKastritsa which is really the edge of these dramatic cliffs.

There are grottos, beaches (many only reachable by small boat), a small marina, and many cafes and hotels carved into the cliffs with views that are truly fantastic.

We stopped at the top of one of the grottos and could see many young people at a cafe called "The Grotto" carved into the rock at least 100 steps down. Below was a popular swimming hole and a rope the daring can climb to a good 50 foot dive into the sea.

Next, we ventured up a road which took us to a spit with an old church and great views up and down the coast.

We could see some umbrellas way up high on the cliffs to the north so we decided to try and find them. Up a very twisted road through a village named Lakones, we arrived at the 'Golden Fox' which was a restaurant, cafe, swimming pool, and a few shops up top for tourists. What a view!! We could not only see up and down the beautiful east coast of Corfu, we could see right across the island to the west with the Adriatic and Albania in the background.

After a nice lunch, we continued along the most exciting road. Rob says he has never done this many switchbacks in one tour. We saw incredible olive groves, tiny villages and popped out at Prinylas which gave us a view of the entire top end of Corfu looking across to the small islands to the north, Othoni and Erikoussa (where we stopped on our way here from Montenegro).

We passed through Pagi, a small village where filming was done for the 1981 Bond film, For Your Eyes Only.

We made our way along intending to get back to the marina to meet the fellow helping us with our limping water maker motor. We wondered if we would have trouble as the gas light popped on and there was truly no sign of people let alone a fuel station.

As we passed through a tiny town, we saw a small auto service shop and they directed us to fuel. Whew!!!

We continued along switch back after switch back until we emerged through the mountain to the west side of Corfu. The road was straight from here and we could actually see all the way to Corfu town from where we were part way up the mountain.

Once back in Gouvia Marina, we enjoyed a capuccino and some ice cold water at the Skipper's Cafe.

Cappuccino before leaving Gouvia for Paleokastritsa