Greece travel guide: choosing mainland and island bases

The short answer

Plan Greece by the places you want to see, then choose the town or island that serves them. XTOUR's Greek destinations are twelve towns and islands: Athens, Thessaloniki, Kalambaka, Delphi, Nafplio, Ioannina, Heraklion, Chania, Santorini, Mykonos, Rhodes and Corfu Town.

Several of the sites XTOUR's guides cover are not inside any of them. Sounion is reached from Athens, Mycenae and Epidaurus from Nafplio, the Meteora monasteries from Kalambaka, the sanctuary and museum of Delphi from the village of Delphi, Knossos from Heraklion, the Samaria Gorge from Chania and Delos from Mykonos. XTOUR's records give Aigai, Phaistos, Malia, Olympia and Mystras no base among its destinations; for Aigai, XTOUR suggests Thessaloniki. XTOUR has no routing provider and no ferry data, so it gives no road, rail or sea times anywhere on this page.

Regions are names, bases are towns and islands

Greece can be described by its regions and island groups, such as the Peloponnese, Crete or the Cyclades. Visit Greece, the national tourism organisation, has a page for the Peloponnese as a whole, which places Nafplio in Argolida.[1] Those names are useful for reading a map. They are not places to stay. How the Greek National Tourism Organisation groups the islands, and where its groups differ from the administrative regions, is explained in Greek island groups explained, and the comparison of Santorini, Mykonos, Crete and Corfu sets out which sites XTOUR maps inside and outside each island destination.

XTOUR has no region pages. It plans towns and islands as destinations and places a site inside a town only when it lies there. A site that a town is only a base for is described as reached from that town, never as inside it.

Athens

Athens is the base for the Acropolis, whose main buildings, the Parthenon, the Propylaia, the Erechtheion and the Temple of Athena Nike, Hellenic Heritage attributes to Pericles' building programme of the second half of the fifth century BC.[2] The Acropolis Museum is a separate institution with its own ticket.[3]

Two guides cover the city's ancient core: the Acropolis and Athens archaeological sites ticket guide, which sets out who issues site tickets and what the official terms say, and the comparison of the Acropolis and the Acropolis Museum. The National Archaeological Museum is a different institution again, and the National Archaeological Museum guide goes through its collections one by one.

Sounion is not in Athens. Hellenic Heritage gives the address of its archaeological site as the 68th kilometre of the Athens-Sounion highway, Sounion, Lavreotiki.[4] XTOUR plans the cape and its Temple of Poseidon from Athens, and the Sounion guide says what is on the site and how its tickets work.

Nafplio and the Peloponnese

Visit Greece describes Nafplio as the first capital of Greece, a town with a Venetian aura, the Palamidi fortress and the sea fortress of Bourtzi, and names Epidaurus beside it.[1] Its Tiryns page calls Tiryns one of the most significant monuments of the Mycenaean civilisation and says its ruins, together with Mycenae, are on the UNESCO World Heritage List.[5] Hellenic Heritage lists the Ephorate of Antiquities of Argolis as the contact for Mycenae.[6] XTOUR plans those two citadels and the sanctuary of Epidaurus from Nafplio.

Olympia is different. Visit Greece places it on the western side of the Peloponnese,[1] and Hellenic Heritage between the Alpheios and Kladeos rivers.[17] None of XTOUR's destinations serves as its base. Mystras, which Hellenic Heritage says was inscribed by UNESCO in 1989,[18] is in Laconia, where Visit Greece names Sparta as the starting point;[1] XTOUR has no base there either, and Mystras: visiting the Byzantine castle town covers the site and its ticket. The guide to Mycenae, Epidaurus, Olympia and the other Peloponnese sites says what each site is and why only some of them share a base.

Kalambaka and Meteora

Visit Greece calls Meteora the most significant monastic centre in Greece after Mount Athos and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its page lists six operating monasteries: Great Meteoron, Varlaam, Agia Triada, Roussanou, Agios Nikolaos Anapafsas and Agiou Stefanou, which it describes as a convent.[7]

XTOUR plans the six monasteries from the town of Kalambaka and treats each monastery as its own place rather than treating Meteora as one point. Each monastery's weekly closing days and the dress rules published for them are set out in the guide to visiting the Meteora monasteries.

Delphi

Delphi was the sanctuary and oracle of Apollo, and Hellenic Heritage says the sanctuary was discovered during the "great excavation" of 1860 to 1903.[8] The website delphi.culture.gr, titled "The Archaeological Site of Delphi - Museum of Delphi", places the site 400 metres from the present-day village of Delphi, with the modern road dividing the Sanctuary of Athena Pronaia from the Sanctuary of Apollo.[9] Hellenic Heritage lists the Ephorate of Antiquities of Phocis as its contact.[8] XTOUR's Delphi destination is that modern village, a base for the site and its museum rather than the place that contains them, and the guide to visiting Delphi covers the two sanctuaries, the museum, their shared ticket and the areas the Ministry of Culture lists as closed.

Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki is a base in its own right. Hellenic Heritage gives the address of the Polycentric Museum of Aigai as Vergina.[10] XTOUR's record for Aigai gives it no base; XTOUR's suggestion is to plan it from Thessaloniki, without treating Vergina as part of the city, and the guide to Aigai and its Polycentric Museum explains how the Royal Tombs, the Palace and the museum buildings fit together.

The city's own Roman and Byzantine monuments, and what kind of visit each one is, are covered in the guide to Thessaloniki's Roman and Byzantine monuments.

Crete: Heraklion and Chania

Heraklion is the base for Knossos and home to the archaeological museum that, according to Visit Greece, holds the palace's original frescoes and storage jars. Visit Greece says Knossos was recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2025,[11] and Hellenic Heritage says it was inscribed together with five other Minoan palaces.[12] The guide to Knossos and the Heraklion Archaeological Museum explains how the two visits divide. XTOUR has no destination in the municipalities of the palaces of Phaistos and Malia, and its records give neither a base; the guide to Phaistos and Malia compares them.

Chania is the second Cretan base. Hellenic Heritage says the modern city bore the ancient name of Kydonia, that the Minoan palace complex on Castelli Hill in the Old Town is one of the recently inscribed palaces, and that it has not been fully excavated because much of it lies beneath the modern city.[13] XTOUR treats Chania as a base for the Samaria Gorge, not as the place that contains it; the Samaria Gorge guide sets out who decides when the gorge opens, how closures are announced and how its two entrances are reached.

Santorini

XTOUR plans Santorini as one island destination, with Oia and Fira as parts of it rather than separate destinations. Its archaeological sites include Akrotiri, a prehistoric town buried by an eruption of the Thera volcano,[14] and Ancient Thera; the guide to Akrotiri and Ancient Thera compares the two, sets out where official pages disagree on when Akrotiri was buried, and gives the official notices on each site's status.

Mykonos and Delos

Mykonos is an island destination and the base for Delos. Delos is a separate island, which Hellenic Heritage says has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1990 and describes as reached by boat from Mykonos.[15] The Delos explainer sets out why XTOUR never describes it as part of Mykonos.

Corfu Town

XTOUR's Ionian base is Corfu Town rather than the whole island. The Ministry of Culture's Castle Route page says the Old Town of Corfu, its two fortresses and its perimeter fortifications were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2007.[16] How the Old and New Fortresses differ as visits, and why XTOUR treats the Achilleion as outside the town, is set out in the guide to Corfu's Old Town and its fortresses.

Rhodes and Ioannina

XTOUR's Rhodes destination is the whole island, and its record for the Palace of the Grand Master places the palace on it. The guide to the Palace of the Grand Master and the Medieval City of Rhodes explains how the palace, the walls and the walled town relate and which of them are ticketed.

XTOUR also has an Ioannina destination, which no XTOUR guide covers yet.

Places XTOUR does not list

XTOUR does not list Mount Athos as a place and gives no advice of any kind about visiting it.

What XTOUR does not tell you

XTOUR does not publish travel times, ferry routes, flight connections or road conditions between these bases, because it has no routing or ferry data. It does not publish opening hours, prices or booking rules on this page; each site's official operator publishes them, and the decision guides linked above say where. It does not rank the bases. Which one suits a trip depends on which sites matter to you.