Corfu

CORFU OVERVIEW

• Things to do: villages - Corfu town, Dassia, Ipsos, Gouvia, Paleokastritsa, activities - beach hopping, quad rental, cliff diving, Casa Parlante
• Places to eat: Dassia - Alexandros Taverna, Alex Garden Bar - Restaurant, Ipsos - Phevos, Gouvia - 9 Muses, Corfu town - Fishalida, Pizzeria a mano,  Psakarki
• Foods to try: gyros, mixed grill, seafood here is really fresh too

I'll start this one off with a bit of a disclaimer. When I went to Greece, I had not started this blog and I was pretty useless at taking photos and often didn't bother. I've had a few pals ask me about Greece recently, so I thought I would write an article with an overview of my trip. My photos aren't as suitable as my more recent posts, and I definitely wasn't planning on sharing some of these publicly so I'll ask for a bit of mercy on that front.

Ever since I saw Mamma Mia (and then rewatched it at least three times), I wanted to go to Greece. Generally when people think of Greece, the main islands come to mind - Santorini, Mykonos, Ios etc. My mum accidentally spread a rumour that Mamma Mia was filmed in Santorini, which I realised after is actually incorrect. Due to the increasing popularity of the Greek islands, a lot of the islands are relatively commercialized and centered around tourism, which means they can often attract a pretty fancy crowd. Of course, this also means they're a lot more expensive. Myself and Alex tend to go for a more casual vibe, and we wanted to go for some nice beaches, scenery and good food. For that reason, Corfu which is a bit more of an understated island seemed pretty perfect for us. I also suffer from travel sickness and therefore try to minimize the flight and travel time, so the direct Ryanair flights from Dublin sealed the deal for me. 

I closed my first house during the same week I was in Corfu. I had to send my mum to go and collect the keys from the real estate agent while I was sipping pina coladas made with fresh pineapple juice. The estate agent was quite judgemental throughout the process and didn't believe that I had the money to actually buy the house until it went through. For that reason, I was actually quite sad to miss smugly thanking her for her "support" throughout the process. With the house closing, this was a pretty exciting time for me, but as you can imagine it also meant that I was most definitely budgeting. Even still, it ended up being one of our favourite holidays so it's ideal for anyone in a similar financial position where you don't want to spend heaps on a fancy hotel and every time you go out for dinner. 

Real footage of me sticking it to the real estate agent and celebrating my new shoebox sized house that rendered me broke

ACCOMMODATION

I spent a good bit of time researching nice places to stay. We tend to love smaller boutique hotels, and I found one which has since changed its name, now known as "TRYP by Wyndham Corfu Dassia". I'm not sure if there has been an ownership transfer or what the significance of the name change has been, but based on my research the hotel seems to have stayed the same. The most amazing thing about this place was the staff, and we even ended up making pals with a few of them (at least I'm hoping the feeling was mutual). It was cool to be able to come back and chat to them about what we had done during the day. They were great at giving us recommendations and sharing information about the culture of the island.

The hotel was in an area along the east coast of the island called Dassia. Initially I was worried it would be too far out, but after doing some research I realised there were a good few restaurants around the area too so we decided to go for it. The reviews were incredible, some of the best I've seen, and there was a good deal on at the time where we got a fairly decent discount. As soon as we reached the hotel, I knew I had made a good call. The staff were so incredibly welcoming and immediately sat us down for a quick bit of food before they closed the restaurant for the night. It was such a gorgeous setting out on their terrace with outdoor lights and we instantly felt comfortable. We had the most delicious olive tapenade with fresh bread and olive oil, which I seek out to this day. 

Our room was really nice and clean with a lovely little balcony outside too. We got one of the cheaper rooms, so the only thing I will say is that it was a bit tight on space for our week long break. If your budget allows, I would recommend sizing up as it can feel a little tight with a longer stay. If not don't worry, the balcony made a big difference and it meant we could sit outside in the evenings and have a drink there. We had breakfast included in our package and there was a decent spread for a hotel breakfast. It wasn't anything spectacular in terms of food, but it did the job and the setting was really nice. You could go straight out to the deck and enjoy your breakfast in the sunshine with a nice ice coffee. After breakfast, you could float around to the pool area where you could lounge there or opt for one of the more private loungers further into the garden area.

The cocktails in the hotel were delicious, and our new barman friend (who was also called Alex) explained to us how they only used the freshest ingredients to make them. We didn't really eat dinner in the hotel as we like to explore a bit for that, but we did have lunch by the pool a few times which was really nice. It was on one of those days, that we encountered our first real problem. We had ordered a cacio de pepe along with another dish, the cacio pepe was stellar, and we both wanted to eat it. Essentially there were two people, and one portion of cacio de pepe. It nearly tore apart our long term relationship but finally we decided we wouldn't let it ruin our holiday and reluctantly agreed to share. 

The cacio de pepe that nearly brought our holiday to a crushing end

The outside terrace is really nice to sit and have a cocktail before you go out to dinner. We would often time the bus and enjoy a cocktail in my favourite floating egg chair as we waited for it to arrive. If we were to visit Corfu again, we would definitely come back to the hotel. It was a lovely setting, great standard of food and drink, and the staff really were just the cherry on top.

Alex enjoying his beer when it was his turn on the egg chair 

THINGS TO DO 

The cool thing about Corfu is that you can really balance the relaxing beach holiday vibe with activities too. This is something myself and Alex struggle a bit with when we go on holidays. He loves to lie on the beach but I generally get bored and essentially just annoy him until he agrees to do an activity with me. The scenery in Greece is so beautiful though that it's much easier to sit back and soak it in, plus you can do some beach hopping which will definitely keep you entertained. It was really nice to just walk to the beach in Dassia and then keep walking down it and see where you end up. The water is also some of the clearest water I've seen. There were a few nice beach towns along the coast which were pretty close to us, which had a range of places to eat, drink and go for a swim. A quick note on this, we had a couple of meals along the beach in Dassia that weren't great. I'd recommend checking reviews if you can before sitting down along there for a bite.

Getting around was made pretty easy by the very handy bus stop right outside our hotel, it would bring you all the way to Corfu old town (about 20 mins) and there were also a few different beach towns along the route. We used the bus very frequently as taxis were extremely expensive. Be warned on this, we jumped in a taxi one night because we missed the bus and ended up shocked at how ridiculous the fare was (especially when everything else is so reasonable). It's completely not worth it, so time your buses and make sure you leave enough time. We also booked a transfer to and from the airport with the hotel to make sure we were getting fair prices, so I would highly recommend doing that too.

Peaceful promenade at Ipsos in the evening time

Ipsos was a cool beach town just north along the coast from Dassia. We had a few nice meals here and the village was lively. Our nicest meal here was in a Greek place called Phevos, which we ended up trying due to the amount of people inside which is always a good sign. They do lovely traditional Greek food, which we really enjoyed throughout the trip. Gyros, homemade pita and fresh salad was a staple of the holiday. There are also a few beach bars that have seating on the sand, so it was nice to have a few cocktails down by the sea too either pre or post food. 

Alex was screwed when I got this in my fortune cookie, the egg chair was finally mine

Corfu town is set on the east coast of the island, roughly half way down. We were so impressed by it and made the 20 minute bus journey here on a few occasions. There are a few traditional shops, selling produce from the island, which are really nice to wander through. If you like Greek food, there are plenty of places to buy local spices for cooking or nice olive oils. There's a little train that you can jump on which brings you around the city. Personally I love these mini trains so I enjoyed it, despite the very weird music choices which were strange covers of pop songs where everything sounded tacky. Alex on the other hand hated every second of this. 

Me loving life and Alex pretending to have fun on the Corfu train

There are stunning viewpoints all across the island, some of which are in the old town itself so you can definitely spend some time just strolling around. We also had a few really nice meals here. There is a lovely Italian called Pizzeria a mano which we ended up going to twice. Their pizzas were unreal and Alex got talking to the chef who told him how he goes around to multiple different suppliers on the island tasting their tomatoes until he finds the right ones. I respect the hell out of this level of detail, and it showed in the food. In fairness the tomatoes were top class. 

There were another couple of fish restaurants we went to in the old town which were delicious and fresh -  Psakarki was close to the beach and we had a nice bottle of wine there too with our food. Fishalida was closer to the centre of town and while the food was great it was a little bit more expensive than the other restaurants we had been to. You won't be short of nice places to go in the town, they're dotted everywhere and if you check to see which places look busier or even have a peek on tripadvisor you should be safe enough. 

If you like history, we went to this hilarious museum in Corfu town called Casa Parlante. It was quick and we were in and out within 40 minutes, so it isn't anything too heavy. They have an old house set up exactly how it would have been in the 19th century, complete with moving robots to resemble the family that lived there. We were the only two people on the tour and our tour guide was very knowledgeable. She brought us through the different rooms of the house, and explained the Greek culture back in the day and all about their daily life. Alex still laughs about how weird it was, but I swear he enjoyed himself, even if he isn't willing to admit it. 

Quad bikes seem to be fairly common on the Greek islands, and as a self confessed granny driver this made me nervous. After much convincing, I reluctantly agreed to rent one out for the day if Alex promised both to keep within the speed limit and keep the beers to a minimum. It pains to me admit that this ended up being one of our best days. We drove right across the island to the west coast, where the scenery was spectacular. We got to stop off at a few different viewpoints at our own leisure, which we wouldn't have had the opportunity to do without the freedom of our own vehicle. If quads are a no go for you, I'd recommend getting at least a car for the day so you can experience some of this. Try and drive along as much as the coast as you can, even if it means a bit of a longer journey.

We stopped off in a place I had read about, La Grotta. The appeal of this place was not the food or the drink, but the setting and water features. There's a diving board built into the cliff and you can also climb up the side of the rocks and jump off. This didn't look crazy high when approaching it, but trust me when you're up there it's a different gravy. I would be fairly comfortable with heights and I surprised myself at nearly bailing - the fear of the potential hit to my reputation finally pushed me off the cliff. We didn't eat here, but from what I saw the food looked basic enough so I'd recommend sticking to a drink and then finding somewhere nice to eat further into one of the coastal villages. 

La Grotta, stunning place for a drink, swim and cheeky cliff dive

After we had got our fix from the cliffs and water, we moved towards the village of Paleokastritsa. We parked the quad and walked up towards the monastery, all along the high cliff faces and looked out over some phenomenal views. I'm adding a few pictures here, but it's hard to do it justice unless you're actually there in person. 

Views from cliffs of Paleokastritsa, how blue is that water?

We ate in this tiny restaurant called O Meraklis, which seemed like a fairly old traditional Greek spot. It was really casual and by no means fancy, but we had some stellar gyros for next to nothing. There seemed to be a few more touristy style places down in the center, but as a general rule we try to avoid this as the food tends to be more expensive and not as good. It was great to get to eat in one of these smaller more authentic places and experience the way real Greek food is done. 

Another little town you could visit for dinner or a day trip is Gouvia, which is also along our favourite handy bus route. It was about 10 minutes from Dassia and was another beach town with lots of restaurants and places to eat. We had a really nice meal in a place called 9 Muses where I got grilled calamari and Alex got a steak which ended up being larger than him. Everything was fresh and the staff were extremely friendly, so I would definitely recommend this place if you find yourself roaming around Gouvia. There was an Italian right opposite it called Da Roberto e Fei which we didn't get a chance to eat in but it was on our list due to the great reviews it had.

Of course when you've had a long day out, sometimes you want to stay local and relax for the evening without having to travel too far. There were a few nice eateries around the area. One tavern in particular called Alexandros Taverna was delicious, where Alex got a mixed grill and I got (you guessed it) chicken gyros. We actually laughed when we got the bill and realised how cheap it was, thinking they must have left something out. It really makes you realise how crazy the prices in Dublin are, and it's so nice to be able to relax knowing that you're not spending a fortune on your dinner. 

Another nice place was Alex Garden Bar - Restaurant (I feel like everyone in Greece is called Alex), which was a stone's throw from the hotel but there was a catch. The food and drinks were good, plus we managed to catch a football match on their large screen so it's great if there's any sport you're looking to watch over there. They have a lovely garden space with steps up to it and loads of nice trees and pretty lights. The catch - there are cats everywhere! I'm not talking three cats roaming around, I mean so many cats that you can't even count them. I love animals and can say that my dog is truly the purest soul I know. However, I do not trust cats (there are a few exceptions) and I have no proof, but I think a lot of them are conspiring against us. I found it a bit off putting to have cats begging for food when we were trying to eat our meal, so do keep this in mind if it's a deal breaker for you. 

Overall round up, I absolutely loved Corfu. Final words on it would be check the weather for the month you're traveling. Due to its position it is apparently one of the wetter islands, and we did have a couple of showers when we went there in September. I love hot sun on my holidays and ideally I would have liked it a bit hotter. However, travelling off peak has its advantages in terms of less people and cheaper prices. All in all, I would recommend Corfu to anyone. There's a great balance of activity between all the different towns we went to, stunning clear water, and beautiful scenery. As always, if there are any questions I can answer don't hesitate to reach out!

GALLERY