A cloudy mountain, a gorge walk, and a creek running orange

After five days on Thasos and the coast around Kavala (that’s all in our first post), we woke up in Asprovalta with one big thing on the list: Mount Olympus. The home of the gods. Also, it turned out, home of a very good gorge walk for a family pushing a stroller.

25 January: a hammock, and a quiet night by the sea

Slow morning. We rolled out just before eleven, and an hour and a half later we were on the edge of Thessaloniki for a proper supply run — the boring, necessary stuff you need after a week living in a camper.

First, though, a haircut. Man’s World Barber in Kalamaria did a great job, and the barbers spoke English, which (as we noted in our Maps review) helped a lot.

The best part of the shopping happened in Pylaia, on the east side of the city. There was a hammock on display. Of course there was. Within about a minute the kids were stretched out in it, and we were standing there pretending we weren’t thinking about buying one.

By late afternoon we’d had enough of the city. We drove out south-east and slept by the sea in Nea Kallikrateia, right by Arizones beach. Good clean sand, beach bars all shuttered for winter, just a few people walking dogs — “pretty quiet” in January, as our Maps review puts it. Quiet street, quiet night.

26 January: Litochoro and the gorge

Early start. About an hour and a half down the coast road, with the mountain somewhere up there in the clouds the whole way. We pulled into Camping Sylvia near Leptokarya — one of the few campgrounds around here open in the off-season, which is the main thing we said in our Maps review — and took the morning easy.

Mid-afternoon we headed up to Litochoro, the village that sits right at the foot of Mount Olympus. Driving a camper through those streets is a little tight — church tower ahead, stone houses on both sides, everyone breathing in.

From the stone terrace in the village you look straight up toward the mountain. It didn’t show itself. It stayed wrapped in cloud all afternoon, which honestly felt about right for a place where gods live.

Just above the village is the way into Olympus National Park and the Enipeas Gorge. There’s a big painted trail map at the start. We studied it like we were going to summit. We were not going to summit.

What we did do was walk in for a while, stroller and all. The first stretch is paved and easy, and within a few minutes you’re under huge grey cliffs, pine trees hanging off the rock, and the river somewhere down below.

Clouds kept rolling over the tops of the cliffs and sliding down into the gorge. Cold, a bit damp, and completely beautiful. We called it “an absolute gem” in our Maps review, and we stand by that.

Our littlest rode on shoulders for the selfie, and we got the one photo of the day where all of us are actually looking at the camera.

We walked back down into the village as the light went, then drove the ten minutes back to the campsite for the night.

27 January: blue sky, and a creek running orange

We left late morning and drove south. Once you’re round the mountain, the road runs through the Vale of Tempe area past Kato Olympos — and suddenly the sky opened up. Blue, big clouds, green hills. After a grey day in the gorge it felt like someone had switched the lights on.

Just after one we pulled into Kokkino Nero. The name means “red water”, and it’s not a figure of speech. Iron-rich water comes out of the hillside and runs through old stone pools and channels, and everything it touches is stained a deep rust orange.

We just kept saying “look at the colour” to each other, over and over.

Behind the pools there’s a little path into the trees, along a creek, to a mossy waterfall. Dad went ahead to check the crossing, hopping from stone to stone.

Then we all sat by the waterfall for a bit. Green moss, falling water, the sound of the creek.

Before we left there were kisses all round, right there by the springs. It was that kind of day.

We spent almost two hours there, then drove on south through Thessaly in the late afternoon light and stopped for the night on the coast near Nea Anchialos, not far from Volos.

One cloudy mountain, one gorge, and a creek running orange. Next stop: properly hot water, at the Thermopylae hot springs.