With traditional, white-washed Cycladic villages straight out of central casting, dozens of pretty beaches and a handful of ancient ruins, it’s a miracle that Paros isn’t already overrun with tourists. This idyllic Cyclades island is one of the most beautiful in Greece, and is getting more popular with every year. Paros is home to beautiful villages like Parikia, Naoussa and Lefkes, dozens of beaches and lively, welcoming communities. Luckily, it has avoided the over tourism that has wreaked havoc on Santorini and Mykonos. During our two-week trip to Greece, we spent 3 Days in Paros after attending a wedding in Chalkida.

Paros is my idea of paradise. I couldn’t quite believe how perfect the island was for us, and I was very sad to leave on our last day. We stayed in Parikia, Paros’ pretty port capital, and used the local bus and a hire car to get around the island. After Paros, we visited Sifnos and Milos.

Parikia

We flew from Athens to Paros with Aegean Air, which was only a little more expensive than the ferry. I’d normally opt for a train or a ferry over a flight, but in this case the benefits of flying far outweighed the slower, turbulent and unpredictable ferries. The flight took twenty minutes, rather than the 4-5 hours it would take on the ferry, which was also likely to be very rocky and delayed many hours due to high summer winds. At the one-room airport, we were surprised to be greeted by our host, Nikki, who very kindly picked us up and drove us into town, detouring through the Parikia waterfront to give us a quick lay of the land. Her B&B, Pavlis Studio, is a ten-minute walk from the waterfront, and is one of only a handful of buildings in the area.

Dinner & Drinks in Parikia

We didn’t get out for dinner until after 9pm. Luckily, in Greece nothing much happens before midnight, even on a Monday. We had dinner at Ephesus, which specialises in the cuisine of Asia Minor. Ephesus is on a quieter edge of the Parikia waterfront, with a large outdoor dining area with tables right at the water’s edge. We shared some dolmades (rice wrapped in vine leaves) and baked saganaki, which were both delicious.

From our table, we were right by the water and had a view across the small harbour to the hills, dotted with a few houses, and towards the port in the distance, which was lit up by a string of restaurants.

Afterwards, we stopped in at Parea Café, a lively family-run café and restaurant that had live music in the courtyard that evening. The courtyard was buzzing, and everyone was getting into the live music from a local band. We shared some tzatziki, which was so much creamy and fresher tasting than anything I’ve had outside Greece. Another difference I noticed in Greek food, in Greece as opposed to in Greek restaurants in foreign countries, is that taramasalata in Greece is not pink!

I wish we’d had room for more food at Parea, but we were completely full. After we finished our drinks, we walked into the Old Town of Parikia, which is a few blocks back from the waterfront. At first glance, Parikia looks like a relatively modern little port town, but once you walk a few blocks inland you’ll find one of the prettiest traditional Cycladic villages in Greece.

We went to Pirate Bar, a cosy and tiny cocktail bar with a very impressive cocktail menu. No gross tourist cocktails here! We started making our way home at around 1am, taking our time as we explored the pretty streets.

Photographing Parikia’s Old Town

The next morning, I got up early and walked into Parikia’s Old Town by myself, to take some photos of the village before the ferries started arriving and the crowds trickled in. Later on, I met David at the beach in Parikia, called Livadia. It was only 8 or 9am, yet I still had most of the streets to myself. It was so peaceful!

Livadia Beach Club

Livadia is a pretty beach with clear, calm waters and a reasonably priced beach club (10 Euro per day for a pair of beach chairs). By Paros’ high standards, it’s not the most beautiful beach on the island, but it’s relatively uncrowded and was easy for us to get to, just a short walk from where we were staying. As such, as visited every day we were in Paros.

After we were done, we walked back into the old town to have breakfast at a cafe I’d spotted that morning, Mana Mana. The food was fresh and nice, but like most European cuisines, Greek cuisine really comes into it’s own for lunch, dinner and dessert, rather than breakfast. After breakfast, it was back to the beach! After a hectic couple of months in New York, and a busy couple of days flying into Greece for the wedding and then getting to Paros, it was really nice to have a really lazy day with no firm plans.

Dinner & drinks in Naoussa

In the evening, we took the local bus to Paros’ other major village, Naoussa. Naoussa is more of a resort town, and is the more popular choice for travellers staying in Paros. It’s a little more expensive, and much busier and there isn’t a swimming beach directly in the town, although there are some close by. Naoussa has a gorgeous harbour, the island’s best restaurants and bars, and also a strip of nightclubs on the edge of town (and the cashed up 18 year olds to go with them). If I had more than 3 days in Paros, I would have split our time between Parikia and Naoussa.

Our first stop was the renowned Ragoussis Bakery, which has been serving both traditional and innovative Greek pastries for four generations. We chose an assortment of sweet pastries, but there was so much more that I wanted to try – I’ve never seen a bakery like it! Many of the items featured the holy trinity of greek pastries: phyllo, honey and nuts. When I think pastry and desserts, I usually think of French or English creations, so I was delighted to discover that there’s a whole world of desserts that I haven’t tried yet. Yum.

We had arrived at around 6 or 7pm, which is quite early for Greece, so we scoped out a few restaurants along the water before putting our name down for a table at 8:30pm, at Sigi Ikthios. In the mean time, we visited the old Venetian fortress, which is semi-submerged in the water, and had a drink at a bar called Agosta, which is perched up above the main square and has beautiful views over the harbour.

Our meal at Sigi Ikthios was one of the best meals I had in Greece. The dishes were simple and modern, and showcased local produce like tomatoes, octopus and capers.

After dinner, we wandered around Naoussa looking for a bar I’d read about, but couldn’t find it. We went to a cute cocktail bar called Trickster, which specialises in the bitter end of the spectrum – serving mostly apertif and digestifs. Highly recommend stopping in here for a post-dinner drink, the cocktails were beautifully balanced and I could have stayed here all night! However, we had a bus to catch back to Parikia.

Beach-hopping around Paros

We wanted to explore the island beyond what the bus route would allow, so we hired a car one day from the Parikia waterfront. It was around 55 Euros for the day, which was a fair price given all that we were able to see as a result. We made a route around the northern half of the island, full of beaches, villages and delicious food and wine.

Exploring Lefkes

Lefkes is one of the most beautiful traditional Cycladic villages that I’ve seen in the Greek islands. This tiny, well-preserved village is tucked up away in the hills of Paros, and served as the island’s capital in medieval times. At the time, it was ideal to build major settlements away from the coastline, to protect against pirate raids. These days, the coastal villages like Parikia, Naousa and Piso Livadi are bigger, because they’re popular with tourists. Lefkes has been left mostly untouched by mass tourism, which makes it an enchanting place to spend a morning wandering.

Read more: Lefkes: Paro’s enchanting medieval capital

We drove from Parikia, and parked at the free car park just outside the entrance to Lefkes. There are public buses that stop at Lefkes, but by arriving before around 10:30am, we managed to have the village mostly to ourselves before the most popular buses of the day started arriving.

Swimming at Molos

From Lekfes, we drove to the eastern coast of the island to Molos, an “unorganised” beach. This just means that there isn’t a beach club, so it’s going to be a lot quieter than the “organised” beaches, which attract more tourists. Getting there was a bit of an adventure, as Google Maps loved to try and take us through the TINIEST streets that really weren’t built for cars. This happened lots during our trip, and there was lots of slow, careful reversing around windy streets, once we realised we could go no farther.

Molos’ water was so clear and warm, and calm, that we could have spent all day just floating in the sea. From the water, we could see the larger neighbouring island, Naxos, as a hazy set of mountains on the horizon. We visited lots of beautiful beaches when we were in Greece, but these nearly-deserted ones were my favourite. There’s nothing like being able to see nothing but a clear blue sky, endless calm sea and your favourite person in the world beside you.

Eventually, however, our stomachs got the better of us and we set off to find lunch. I’d heard about O Tsitsanis, a taverna in the tiny one-street town of Prodromos, which is mostly untouched by tourism.

Lunch in Prodromos

Lunch at O Tsitsanis was one of the most blissful meals of our trip. The taverna courtyard was empty, apart from two other tables, and a few taverna cats. We ordered a few local dishes, like oven baked chickpeas, and some local soft cheese, and the waitress kindly brought out an accompanying hard local cheese to go with it. Apart from the quiet chatter in Italian and Spanish from the other tables in the background, all we could hear was the buzzing of cicadas and the occasional meow of one of the kittens. Lunch was so simple and delicious, and for the two of us cost 17 Euros. I would have come back again (and very hungry!) for dinner, if we’d had the hire car for more that one day.

Santa Maria Beach Club

After lunch, we drove to the north-eastern corner of Paros to Santa Maria Beach Club. Santa Maria has a popular campground and the Beach Club here has a party atmosphere, and is much busier than any of the other beaches we visited. Again, we could see Naxos on the horizon, and the water was super clear. Between swims, we had a glass of wine, which was a little over priced being the beach club, but it’s hard to say no to a glass of rose on such a beautiful day!

The only thing which made it a little harder to relax was that I’d brought my DSLR camera with me to the beach, not realising it would be quite so busy. It was the busiest beach we visited, and if David and I were both in the water I felt I had to keep an eye on our stuff. Next time, I’d leave any valuables behind! At the other beach clubs we visited, our chair was usually close to the water and the clubs were quieter, so I didn’t need to worry.

Wine Tasting at Moraitis Winery

Our next stop was Moraitis Winery’s cellar door. Moraitis is the only cellar door (tasting room) that I know of on Paros, and I spotted their wines in restaurants all over the three islands we visited. We chose the shorter of the two tastings, since David had to drive, and they provided some free cheese to go along with it. In Australia, wine tastings are usually held standing at the bar, but at Moraitis we were seated at our own table, and a server came over at regular intervals to present the next wine,  before leaving us for a few minutes to enjoy it. It was a really nice way to do a wine tasting, and I really loved so many of their wines!

We tried Greek varietals like Malagousia, Monemvassia and Assyrtiko, and there several bottles I would have loved to take home with me, had I ANY room in my over-stuffed suitcase. Unfortunately, they don’t ship internationally from the cellar door, so I had to settle with picking their wines as often as I could when I saw it at restaurants in the islands. I love doing wine tastings just about anywhere, but especially enjoy it when I can try new varietals that are native to a region, that I don’t usually see at home.

Kolimpithres

Our second-last beach stop of the day was Kolimpithres, sometimes spelled Kolymbithres. This beach is famous on the island for it’s unusual landscape, covered in dusky boulders. It was after 5pm by this time, so the beach club had closed for the day and it was getting a little bit too cool to swim. Instead, we climbed up onto some of the boulders and enjoyed the view – there was hardly anyone else around by this point.

Sunset at Parasporos

Our final stop of the day was on the southwest side of the island, at Parasporos Beach. Nikki had pointed this out as her favourite beach in Paros on the day we arrived, and we made it there just in time for sunset. Because the beach club was closing shortly, we only paid half price to have the chairs for around an hour. We saw one of the most glorious sunsets of the trip (and my life) over the crashing waves, and there was only one other group on the entire beach. Parasporos is a famous beach, and judging by the size of the two beach clubs, it’s very popular during the day. I could hardly believe that we had the beach nearly to ourselves during such a spectacular sunset – I felt so lucky. I was reminded of photos of the crowds in Santorini at sunset, as the pathways and squares become choked with tourists every evening, waiting for the famous Santorini sunset.

A bonus day!

I thought I had booked a morning ferry to our next destination, Sifnos, but I was not at all disappointed when I realised I’d booked one for the late afternoon. I used the unexpected free morning to visit the Panagia Katapoliani, or “Church of 100 Doors” and climb up to the top of the old town to see the ruins of the Frankish castle, and the Chapel of St Constantine, which is at the highest point in Parikia and has beautiful views over the harbour.

Panagia Katapoliani

Panagia Katapoliani is a Byzantine church complex that was build in the year 326 AD. Inside the complex is a one main chapel, two smaller chapels and a bapistry, thought to have been built by Saint Helen, the mother of Roman Emperor Constantine the Great. There’s a small museum, which I briefly toured, which mostly has artifacts from the 18th century. The courtyard is very pretty and leafy, and there are a few different styles of historic architecture. I didn’t stay for too long, but I did enjoy a brief wander through the complex.

Frankish Castle

The remains of a Frankish castle, built by the Venetians in the 13th century, can be found in the quiet backstreets in the hills of Parikia’s old town. Compared to the heart of the old town, this part of Parikia was very quiet and peaceful. I didn’t know what to expect of a Frankish castle, but I loved the bold geometric patterns that the circular and square bricks made in the tower.

Chapel of St Constantine

My final stop was a little further up the hill past the Frankish Castle, at the highest point in Parikia. The Chapel of St Constantine has a magnificent view across the harbour, and there’s a small restaurant with a terrace which makes the most of the view. I wish I’d known about it earlier, so David and I could have come for dinner!

Afterwards, I met David back at the Livadia beach club for a few peaceful hours on the sand before we caught our ferry to our next stop, Sifnos. Not surprisingly, our ferry was around two hours late.  We both could have spent a week on Paros alone, but there wasn’t a single disappointing island on our trip so I don’t know where I’d choose to spend less time. I would love to return one day, to enjoy some of the same beaches and then some new ones, and also use it as a base for taking day trips to nearby Antiparos and Delos.

Paros is a beautiful island, and it’s very easy to enjoy as a tourist – there are a handful of pretty villages, lots of great beaches, the roads are easy enough to drive and public transport is good. Despite being very popular, it’s remarkably peaceful. I hope that as it grows in popularity, it doesn’t go the same was as Mykonos and Santorini and become hopelessly overcrowded.

Have you been to Paros? Would you like to? Are there any other Greek islands that you’ve visited and loved? Let me know in the comments!