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About Sarti and surroundings June 24, 2010 01:43PM |
Last year, when I met in Greece our host here, Nikos, I promised him I will write some impressions about my vacation in Sarti. Unfortunately, different problems kept me away from the computer, and thus winter came 
But I did not forget about my "debts", so now I am paying them, hoping it will be helpfull to those who are seeking for information about this resort. As I did last year.
Now about Sarti...
Main beach is about 2.5 km length. North and South, there are also several bays, but I do not know if you can swimm there. In one of them we saw some sea urchins.
The village stretches along it, and you can conventionally divided it into two areas. North side, where night life is more intense, is about 1.3 km, and may also be divided into 2 subareas. The northern part has a lot of tavernas along the beach. Between them and the beach there is a long promenade (about 500-600 m). This area continues with another, to the south, which does not have any restaurant on the beach. Here, the boundary between beach and villas consists of a street, that actually continues from the north (the above mentioned area), and which becomes a “false” promenade alley. All tavernas mentioned before, have two entrances, one from the promenade (all having a dining area located in small gardens, connected to it) the other entrance coming from the long street I was talking about. Northern zone of the town is wide, there are several streets parallel to each other, starting from a smal park, which I liked very much (in the center was a circular area with benches all around, with plenty of vegetation: flowers, oleanders and big trees, even from the palm tree family - or what they are :p). Around the park there are stores and restaurants.
Perpendicular to these streets, there are other streets that start from the main road that accompanies the resort alongside the sea. Along the street there are shops and taverns, side by side.
In Sarti there are two night clubs (at least these I found…), one called Macedonia, which is larger (but I cannot say anything about it, because, unfortunately, I did not get into it), the other being a location that I liked, airy, busy just as much as you feel good.
The area is full of life. Actually, what I liked here is that it can appeal to all tastes, offering quiet to those who like to walk on the promenade or in the southern part, the others being able to stick to animation of the central streets.
Southern area of the village, is smaller and very quiet, and has fewer villas and hotels. As I saw, people here had to "commute" to the northern part of the resort.
The connection between these 2 major areas is done through the street parallel to the main road (that surrounds the peninsula, connecting the villages, called Perimetriki Sithonias-). It is the street that I told you that starts from the northern part of the resort. In this transition area there are only few hotels. Here you can fully feel at night the air descending from the western mountains that are relatively close.
Beach, that lies, continually, throughout the whole length of the resort, is sandy, but I am not sure that the origin of the sand is marine. I say this because there are not remnants of crushed shells. Nor will you find some in the water, and although I looked especially, have not really seen snail or clam shells.
In the first half of the north zone you will have the opportunity to use chaise longues under umbrellas, belonging to the tavernas and beach bars (not paying for them, just have to order anything). If you preffer, of course, you can use your towels and umbrellas to sit on the beach. We used to stay at Alma Libre, we liked there more as they had umbrellas of palm leaves, not textile.
What is characteristic to this beach is the way the beach enters the sea. Joking, I would say it is like in a pool: as soon as you stepped into the water, you can swim. The entrance is very sudden, at about 30-45 degrees, so no longer than 2 m away from the "bank" you will find yourself already at 1.5 m depth. Some, who know how to swim, will definitely enjoy this. To the others this will break the mood. You have to decide either if you like it or not. Certainly I would hesitate to go there with young children. Not a very friendly place for them I'd say (although there were kids of 9-10 years having maximum fun, jumping "in the pool." There were also smaller children, but as I said I would not had the guts to leave my own free). If you have small children, you’d rather go to Vourvourou, Sikiti or Port Koufou or Toroni, for example, where the access in the water is smooth, and the shallow water has a much greater length. In addition, 90% of the time there are waves, and they are not quite small, so those who would like the sea water to be “lake type”, you’d better change your mind, you will not find something like this in Sarti. I admit that I do not know exactly if the south area is just the same regarding this, I did not swim there, someone told me that the beach is better there, but looking from "the plane" (I mean from the villa’s terrace) I found that at least in terms of waves it is just the same.
The water is warm and, of course, clear.
What disappointed me a lot was the food. I mention that I used to be a fan of Greek cuisine. Unfortunately, this time either I was bad luck, or do not know what to say.
By all means, do not eat at Noah restaurant! Keep away from it! We went there because we saw all the seats were usualy taken , so we presumed it's a good restaurant. Unfortunately, me, my wife and my son were fully disappointed. I ordered some pork barbecue (they did not have chicken). At first bite I thought were very good, meat was fresh, soft melt in the mouth and well seasoned with various herbs and spices (not too much, just as it should be). But then, I felt the taste of the stove gas, a sign that the crowd present there determined them to decide to use too strong gas to give fire, and barbecue tasted for the specific gas. Just the same for the swordfish ordered by my son, which looked good though, but was extremely fat (swordfish?) and have the same gasy taste. Fact is he got some bites and dropped it. My wife was even more unfortunate (she ordered grilled squid), had one bite, tasted enough. When I tasted the squid to see why, I straightened: besides the already known gas taste was something sticky. Do not know if it was a sign that was not fresh, or other reason, but as result, all next day I layed in bed due to the indigestion that followed. Do not know if we had bad luck (others ate quietly and did not seem unhappy), but I do not recommend you to take the risk.
I enjoyed dinner at Stavros, it seems that there are the most tasty fish. I recommend you. Ordering is a little bit difficult, as it was a Hungarian waiter, who knew no English or any other usual language, so pointing finger on the list was the only solution. The menu list can be a problem to a lot of you, as there have been cases where the menu was only in Greek or Hungarian, so we had struggled to grind Greek version.
There was another restaurant which was quite OK, where the menu was also in Romanian (well, roughly translated), where was a waiter (also Hungarian) whose grandmother was Romanian and who understood Romanian. Do not know how the taverna is called, but you can see the menu with the Romanian flag menu (hoping you know how it looks). Portions were small compared to how I was used to find in Greece, but food was fresh and tasty. I ate there 2 times and it was OK.
At the first restaurant in the north part of the beach I ate a fine roast beef pan with rice and tomato sauce. Also rice scallops and fish are good. But the calamari was terrible, don’t think to order. By all means, try here the home made tsipuro. Ask for it to be without anise. It's all good.
In terms of fast-food, by far the best is Obelix. We ate there once, out of curiosity, and I understood why it was always the row in the street, waiting on the border, for a meal. We had Gyros on the plate with some good sauces, salad and fries. I liked it very much. Do not know if the tsipuro helped to enjoy it so much. And the prices was quite good.
In the vecinity of the central park there is a small fast food (where, obviously, the staff was from Hungary…:p), called Lefer or something like this, where you will find good grilled shrimp (despite the fact they were served without any sauce) and where they serve different menus, at fair prices. Not huge portions, but more important, they are fresh. Gyros pita found there for 1.70 euros (last year price), perfect to have it “on the fly”, on the way to the beach. There is also there, in this square, a small tavern (located immediately next to the travel agency), which has the best local tsipuro. Guaranteed. Together with a plateau for uzo, go there to get a snack before going to dinner.
Best ice cream can be found just 20 m away, at Italian getateria.
We had pizza once at Emilia (also located next to the park). It was not bad, even if not extraordinary. Countertop is strange, you can say it is kinda thicker and longer fried pancake. Anyway, you can try it. If not, nothing to loose.
Conclusion: you will not die of hunger, but what is served is still far away of what we've eaten in other parts of Greece. Especially regarding calamari. I say I couldn’t find a restaurant where to have those delightfull calamari rings which I used to enjoy so much each time I went to Greece. I am not convinced that there were Greek chefs. Even moussaka I ate there was a disaster. It might make a wrong assumption, but I just cannot find another explanation. I remember the taste of the food we ate in other parts of Greece and I cannot believe that the Greeks had forgotten to cook squid or moussaka! Even traditional Greek salad was a huge disappointment: very much (but when I say very I means much to much) onion, and two, maximum three small pieces of cheese (and attention, not always Fetta !!!). Moreover, the even the donuts at the bakery weren’t hot, but probably left over from the previous day. About the house little dessert, which I considered to be kinda Greek tradition, in more than half of taverns, was gone. Which is a shame, it was a nice gesture. Not that melon cubes count for price, but the gesture itself.
List of food was relatively low as diversification. Although some appeared more dishes, in fact they were only on paper. Finally, for me, as a gourmand I am, food chapter was a disappointment.
As a compensation, I can say I liked the ice cream (first time I ordered three cups, as used here, but I could not eat everything, it was huge) and (yes, laugh with me) the corn (baked or boiled) that was sold by two elder ladies (for 1.5 euros). Excellent, best corn I ever ate.
Going over it with the food, otherwise we had no reproaches to made. Starting with the accommodation and continuing with the village, which was beyond my expectations. Vegetation, fresh air and beautiful villas.
I forgot to say that there are also two areas for children. The first is the end of the promenade, which is about in the middle of the resort. Cradles, swings, and a support thing with ropes and elastic nets, where the kids jump up till they have no breath. The second one is close to the south part, a small amusement park.
But I did not forget about my "debts", so now I am paying them, hoping it will be helpfull to those who are seeking for information about this resort. As I did last year.
Now about Sarti...
Main beach is about 2.5 km length. North and South, there are also several bays, but I do not know if you can swimm there. In one of them we saw some sea urchins.
The village stretches along it, and you can conventionally divided it into two areas. North side, where night life is more intense, is about 1.3 km, and may also be divided into 2 subareas. The northern part has a lot of tavernas along the beach. Between them and the beach there is a long promenade (about 500-600 m). This area continues with another, to the south, which does not have any restaurant on the beach. Here, the boundary between beach and villas consists of a street, that actually continues from the north (the above mentioned area), and which becomes a “false” promenade alley. All tavernas mentioned before, have two entrances, one from the promenade (all having a dining area located in small gardens, connected to it) the other entrance coming from the long street I was talking about. Northern zone of the town is wide, there are several streets parallel to each other, starting from a smal park, which I liked very much (in the center was a circular area with benches all around, with plenty of vegetation: flowers, oleanders and big trees, even from the palm tree family - or what they are :p). Around the park there are stores and restaurants.
Perpendicular to these streets, there are other streets that start from the main road that accompanies the resort alongside the sea. Along the street there are shops and taverns, side by side.
In Sarti there are two night clubs (at least these I found…), one called Macedonia, which is larger (but I cannot say anything about it, because, unfortunately, I did not get into it), the other being a location that I liked, airy, busy just as much as you feel good.
The area is full of life. Actually, what I liked here is that it can appeal to all tastes, offering quiet to those who like to walk on the promenade or in the southern part, the others being able to stick to animation of the central streets.
Southern area of the village, is smaller and very quiet, and has fewer villas and hotels. As I saw, people here had to "commute" to the northern part of the resort.
The connection between these 2 major areas is done through the street parallel to the main road (that surrounds the peninsula, connecting the villages, called Perimetriki Sithonias-). It is the street that I told you that starts from the northern part of the resort. In this transition area there are only few hotels. Here you can fully feel at night the air descending from the western mountains that are relatively close.
Beach, that lies, continually, throughout the whole length of the resort, is sandy, but I am not sure that the origin of the sand is marine. I say this because there are not remnants of crushed shells. Nor will you find some in the water, and although I looked especially, have not really seen snail or clam shells.
In the first half of the north zone you will have the opportunity to use chaise longues under umbrellas, belonging to the tavernas and beach bars (not paying for them, just have to order anything). If you preffer, of course, you can use your towels and umbrellas to sit on the beach. We used to stay at Alma Libre, we liked there more as they had umbrellas of palm leaves, not textile.
What is characteristic to this beach is the way the beach enters the sea. Joking, I would say it is like in a pool: as soon as you stepped into the water, you can swim. The entrance is very sudden, at about 30-45 degrees, so no longer than 2 m away from the "bank" you will find yourself already at 1.5 m depth. Some, who know how to swim, will definitely enjoy this. To the others this will break the mood. You have to decide either if you like it or not. Certainly I would hesitate to go there with young children. Not a very friendly place for them I'd say (although there were kids of 9-10 years having maximum fun, jumping "in the pool." There were also smaller children, but as I said I would not had the guts to leave my own free). If you have small children, you’d rather go to Vourvourou, Sikiti or Port Koufou or Toroni, for example, where the access in the water is smooth, and the shallow water has a much greater length. In addition, 90% of the time there are waves, and they are not quite small, so those who would like the sea water to be “lake type”, you’d better change your mind, you will not find something like this in Sarti. I admit that I do not know exactly if the south area is just the same regarding this, I did not swim there, someone told me that the beach is better there, but looking from "the plane" (I mean from the villa’s terrace) I found that at least in terms of waves it is just the same.
The water is warm and, of course, clear.
What disappointed me a lot was the food. I mention that I used to be a fan of Greek cuisine. Unfortunately, this time either I was bad luck, or do not know what to say.
By all means, do not eat at Noah restaurant! Keep away from it! We went there because we saw all the seats were usualy taken , so we presumed it's a good restaurant. Unfortunately, me, my wife and my son were fully disappointed. I ordered some pork barbecue (they did not have chicken). At first bite I thought were very good, meat was fresh, soft melt in the mouth and well seasoned with various herbs and spices (not too much, just as it should be). But then, I felt the taste of the stove gas, a sign that the crowd present there determined them to decide to use too strong gas to give fire, and barbecue tasted for the specific gas. Just the same for the swordfish ordered by my son, which looked good though, but was extremely fat (swordfish?) and have the same gasy taste. Fact is he got some bites and dropped it. My wife was even more unfortunate (she ordered grilled squid), had one bite, tasted enough. When I tasted the squid to see why, I straightened: besides the already known gas taste was something sticky. Do not know if it was a sign that was not fresh, or other reason, but as result, all next day I layed in bed due to the indigestion that followed. Do not know if we had bad luck (others ate quietly and did not seem unhappy), but I do not recommend you to take the risk.
I enjoyed dinner at Stavros, it seems that there are the most tasty fish. I recommend you. Ordering is a little bit difficult, as it was a Hungarian waiter, who knew no English or any other usual language, so pointing finger on the list was the only solution. The menu list can be a problem to a lot of you, as there have been cases where the menu was only in Greek or Hungarian, so we had struggled to grind Greek version.
There was another restaurant which was quite OK, where the menu was also in Romanian (well, roughly translated), where was a waiter (also Hungarian) whose grandmother was Romanian and who understood Romanian. Do not know how the taverna is called, but you can see the menu with the Romanian flag menu (hoping you know how it looks). Portions were small compared to how I was used to find in Greece, but food was fresh and tasty. I ate there 2 times and it was OK.
At the first restaurant in the north part of the beach I ate a fine roast beef pan with rice and tomato sauce. Also rice scallops and fish are good. But the calamari was terrible, don’t think to order. By all means, try here the home made tsipuro. Ask for it to be without anise. It's all good.
In terms of fast-food, by far the best is Obelix. We ate there once, out of curiosity, and I understood why it was always the row in the street, waiting on the border, for a meal. We had Gyros on the plate with some good sauces, salad and fries. I liked it very much. Do not know if the tsipuro helped to enjoy it so much. And the prices was quite good.
In the vecinity of the central park there is a small fast food (where, obviously, the staff was from Hungary…:p), called Lefer or something like this, where you will find good grilled shrimp (despite the fact they were served without any sauce) and where they serve different menus, at fair prices. Not huge portions, but more important, they are fresh. Gyros pita found there for 1.70 euros (last year price), perfect to have it “on the fly”, on the way to the beach. There is also there, in this square, a small tavern (located immediately next to the travel agency), which has the best local tsipuro. Guaranteed. Together with a plateau for uzo, go there to get a snack before going to dinner.
Best ice cream can be found just 20 m away, at Italian getateria.
We had pizza once at Emilia (also located next to the park). It was not bad, even if not extraordinary. Countertop is strange, you can say it is kinda thicker and longer fried pancake. Anyway, you can try it. If not, nothing to loose.
Conclusion: you will not die of hunger, but what is served is still far away of what we've eaten in other parts of Greece. Especially regarding calamari. I say I couldn’t find a restaurant where to have those delightfull calamari rings which I used to enjoy so much each time I went to Greece. I am not convinced that there were Greek chefs. Even moussaka I ate there was a disaster. It might make a wrong assumption, but I just cannot find another explanation. I remember the taste of the food we ate in other parts of Greece and I cannot believe that the Greeks had forgotten to cook squid or moussaka! Even traditional Greek salad was a huge disappointment: very much (but when I say very I means much to much) onion, and two, maximum three small pieces of cheese (and attention, not always Fetta !!!). Moreover, the even the donuts at the bakery weren’t hot, but probably left over from the previous day. About the house little dessert, which I considered to be kinda Greek tradition, in more than half of taverns, was gone. Which is a shame, it was a nice gesture. Not that melon cubes count for price, but the gesture itself.
List of food was relatively low as diversification. Although some appeared more dishes, in fact they were only on paper. Finally, for me, as a gourmand I am, food chapter was a disappointment.
As a compensation, I can say I liked the ice cream (first time I ordered three cups, as used here, but I could not eat everything, it was huge) and (yes, laugh with me) the corn (baked or boiled) that was sold by two elder ladies (for 1.5 euros). Excellent, best corn I ever ate.
Going over it with the food, otherwise we had no reproaches to made. Starting with the accommodation and continuing with the village, which was beyond my expectations. Vegetation, fresh air and beautiful villas.
I forgot to say that there are also two areas for children. The first is the end of the promenade, which is about in the middle of the resort. Cradles, swings, and a support thing with ropes and elastic nets, where the kids jump up till they have no breath. The second one is close to the south part, a small amusement park.
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