A Long Weekend in Kefalonia

Working full time, I am always trying to maximise my holidays, and bank holidays in the UK are always a great time to take a long weekend and get 4-5 days off for just 1-2 days vacation leave. However, if you’re going away for such a short amount of time, it’s hard to justify taking a long flight. I find that Greece, especially Greek Islands, are a great intermediate; the flight is not that long, only about 4 hours from Manchester, but the scenery and culture is so different, it can still feel tropical – especially so in August.

So I booked a flight for over the late August Bank Holiday with Easyjet for a relatively good price and great timings.

Kefalonia can be quite busy and touristy, especially in the South, and I had previously visited the island (albeit about 20 years ago on a family holiday). So I searched the web for a quiet spot where I could relax, experience some Greek culture and indulge in my favourite hobby snorkelling.

I chose the small town on the East Coast called Agia Effimia, it still had a few good hotels and AirBnBs available, looked a bit quiter, but had boats for hire and was easily accesible by road from the airport.

So when I landed I picked up my little rental, which was a Fiat 500, I booked the car with Yours Car rental, a local company, and everything was smooth and easy.

The drive was lovely too, and didn’t take me too long to get there along well maintained and very scenic roads.

I stayed at Odyssey Boutique hotel, which was a short walk from the village centre, as I was able to use my Hotels.com vouchers to get the rate down for the 4 nights stay. It was a nice hotel, but the best thing about the room was the view and proximity to the sea. I went snorkelling (and cooled off) basically as soon as I arrived!

I was in and out of the sea all afternoon, before heading into the village for dinner. Another thing I made sure to check before, was HappyCow – to see if there are any suitable vegan restaurants in advance, and there was a little taverna called To Steki, which did really nice veg food, including these stewed beans, amazing fresh salad and fresh bread, I pretty much went there every night!

For my first day on the island I wanted to hire a little boat and go along the coastline to find myself a private beach. On my holidays as a child, I always did this with my parents, and it was my favourite part of the trip. One holiday we even booked a little villa with a mooring outside, and hired a boat for the entire week, even taking it into the village centre for our evening meals!

So I went down into the village and got a boat with yellow boats. After a quick lesson and being signed-off for knowing how to throw anchor, I set off on my own along the coast. After about 1-2 hours of boating, I found a little pebble beach with nobody else on it, and dropped my anchor to explore. I did some snorkelling, and chilled on the beach, before my peace was finally disturbed by another boat. Although it was entertaining trying to watch them drop anchor (they clearly hadn’t had a lesson in the morning haha).

I had taken some bread and snacks with me, but as my stomach was asking for more, I eventually headed back to the village, taking my time and enjoying the waves.

The boating was amazing, but low power, and not quite enough to cross the narrow straight from Kefalonia to Ithaca – which I’d heard was stunning. So that evening I booked onto a sailing boat trip, a local company with an 8-seater sailer due to go out and visit some of bays on Ithaca.

The morning started early, and after a mix-up with my phone (it obviously hadn’t charged overnight and so my alarm didn’t go off!!!) I ended up running through the village and harbour, and only just made it on time!

The day was amazing, and the colour of the water around the island was just amazing. I loved the sailing. We did do some more snorkelling too, and the boat also had a stand-up paddle board, which I tried for the first time!

Honestly, the snorkelling was disappointing, and all the places I had been so far were actually very sparse, which was quite sad to see… I was not sure if it was my childhood memories being exaggerated, but 20 years ago, a snorkelling trip with my family, was pretty much what ignited my love of the sea, and I even wanted to be a marine biologist for a very long time after. I remember seeing hundreds of fish, rays, and even an octopus. But so far, only a few fish, and absolutely no corals or sponges like I remembered…

So the next day, I decided to take a road trip out to the far North of the island to what my limited research was saying was the “best” snorkelling in Kefalonia…

I drove out on a very scenic road, which took my past many of the famous beautiful sites of the island, including Myrtos Beach (which looked nice from above but was HAMMERED) and Asos, which also looked amazing from the view point. But I continued North, and after a quick lunch pit stop at Fiskardo, I got to Dafnoudi beach. It was a short walk from the road along a little woodland area. The beach was small, and a little busy, but not too bad.

The snorkelling here was much better compared to the other sites, but was still a little sad. And compared to say Galapagos or Indonesia, was nothing really, but I sill had a lovely day.

I took a different road back to Agia Effimia, one which as some points, was only just a road! haha, but was WAY more enjoyable and adventurous to drive down, and gifted me with some wonderful views in the fading light.

I do love Greek islands, there is something about the Greek culture which is just no stress, slower-paced, chilled, happy, healthy. The sea, the food, the sun, it always makes for an extremely relaxing and peaceful holiday. And I am hoping to make this a “tradition” for the August bank holiday haha, just got to decide which island next! Which one would you choose?