Messinia | Pylos Methoni & Costa Navarino

Messinia

The real Greece, all year round

I fell in love with Messinia the very first time I drove into it.

This isn’t the guidebook version of Messinia. It’s the version I tell friends about after thirty years of travelling through Greece.

🧿 Why Messinia?

Messinia lies in the far southwest of the Peloponnese. And perhaps one of the reasons I love it so much is that it very deliberately isn’t Santorini.

No lines of minibuses all heading to exactly the same spot at five o’clock for exactly the same sunset.

Here, the fishing boats are still in Pylos harbour in the morning. The hills are covered in olive trees. And the sea changes colour when the wind changes.

The first time I drove into Messinia, I came down the coastal road from the north, with the sea on one side and olive groves on the other.

I think I was in love before I’d even got out of the car.

After thirty years of organising travel to Greece, I’ve seen an awful lot of the country. But Messinia is where I stayed. I now have my own place in Pylos, and the more time I spend here, the more I discover.

And that’s perhaps the wonderful thing about Messinia. It still feels like the real Greece, but that certainly doesn’t mean there’s nothing to see.

Quite the opposite.

🧿 From my balcony in Pylos

The harbour. The fishing boats. The enormous bay. And the island of Sphacteria stretching across the water like a natural breakwater.

This is the Messinia I want people to discover.

Not just the postcard.

The life behind it.

Messinia at a glance

Around 150,000 inhabitants
Around 60,000 people live in Kalamata, the regional capital
2,991 km² – a little larger than Luxembourg
Around 250 km of coastline and more than 50 named beaches

🧿 Sea, landscape & climate

Messinia has a wonderful Mediterranean climate – and outside the height of summer, you really begin to appreciate just how lovely it is.

August doesn’t have to be the best month at all.

In spring, everything is still beautifully green. By May, there are already days made for sitting by the sea.

And in October, people are still swimming.

Only with far fewer people around.

And the coast is different everywhere you go.

Voidokilia is, of course, the famous one – almost perfectly shaped like a horseshoe. But right beside it is the long beach of Divari, and further on you’ll find Elea, Mikri Mantinia, Foneas and dozens of smaller beaches and coves.

Some are in every guidebook.

Others you discover because somebody who lives here tells you: “Drive down that road.”

Those are often my favourites.

October: around 20–24°C
November: around 19–20°C
December: around 15–18°C
Sea temperature in August: around 25°C
Around 300 days of sunshine a year

🧿 More than 3,000 years of history

And you find that history everywhere.

This is something I think many people simply don’t realise.

Messinia isn’t just sea, olive trees, good food and Costa Navarino. If you love archaeology and history, you could spend days exploring here.

High above the countryside near Chora lies the Palace of Nestor, one of the most important Mycenaean palace complexes in Greece.

Hundreds of Linear B clay tablets were discovered here. They contain the oldest deciphered form of Greek and tell us about administration and everyday life in the Mycenaean kingdom more than 3,000 years ago.

And even then, olive oil played an important role here.

I love that little detail.

Thousands of years later, you’re still driving through a landscape shaped by olive trees.

And Nestor is only the beginning.

Across Messinia you’ll find Mycenaean and other archaeological sites including Peristeria, Nichoria, Malthi, Koukounara, Akovitika and Ancient Thouria.

Peristeria, for example, was an important and wealthy centre during the early Mycenaean period, with impressive monumental tholos tombs.

And then there’s Ancient Messene.

🧿 Ancient Messene – why isn’t everyone here?

I ask myself this every time.

Ancient Messene is one of the most impressive ancient cities in Greece. An entire city with a theatre, agora, sanctuaries, enormous defensive walls and a beautiful stadium you can simply walk through.

And yet it doesn’t have the crowds of Delphi or Olympia.

Perhaps that’s exactly what makes it so special.

Here, you still have time to look. To wander. To imagine what this city must have been like thousands of years ago.

It’s one of those places in Messinia where people naturally become a little quieter.

🧿 Where Venice still lingers – Methoni, Koroni & Navarino

And now we come to a piece of history I could probably talk about for far too long: the Venetians in the Peloponnese.

My background in Italy and my work as an official guide have only made me more fascinated by it. I keep reading, and every time I do, I discover something new.

Methoni and Koroni fascinate me in particular.

In 1209, the Treaty of Sapienza confirmed Venetian rights over Methoni and Koroni. Their position was so important to Venice’s sea routes towards the East that the two fortresses became known as the oculi capitales – the principal eyes of Venice in the East.

Merchant ships passed through here, as did pilgrims travelling to the Holy Land.

And today, you can still walk through these places yourself.

At Methoni, the enormous fortress seems to run straight into the sea. At the far end stands the octagonal Bourtzi on its tiny rocky island, connected to the castle by a narrow stone bridge.

Koroni feels completely different. Its fortress stands high above the sea – and people still live within its walls.

Around Pylos, you’ll also find Paleokastro – Old Navarino – and the later Niokastro, the New Castle of Navarino.

Mycenaeans, ancient Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Franks, Venetians and Ottomans have all left their mark here. Sometimes in the very same wall.

My favourite time to take guests to Methoni is towards the end of the afternoon, when it becomes quieter and the stone walls are still warm from the sun.

Want to know more about Methoni Castle ?

🧿 Pylos & the Battle of Navarino

A beautiful bay with an extraordinary story.

Pylos has, of course, become personal for me. I live here for part of the year and look out across the bay.

But this peaceful bay was also the setting for one of the most important events in modern Greek history.

On 20 October 1827, the Battle of Navarino took place here.

An allied fleet from Britain, France and Russia faced the Ottoman-Egyptian fleet during the Greek War of Independence.

The Ottoman-Egyptian fleet suffered a devastating defeat. The battle became an important turning point in the international developments that eventually led to an independent Greek state.

Navarino is also generally regarded as the last major naval battle fought entirely by sailing ships.

Once you know that story, you look at this quiet bay very differently.

When I look out across the water from Pylos, I’m not simply looking at the sea.

I’m looking at a place where history was made.

1209 Treaty of Sapienza – Three centuries of this area Venetian
1500 Ottoman conquest
1685/1686–1715 Second Venetian Period

🧿 The land of olives

It’s almost impossible to drive anywhere in Messinia without seeing olive trees.

Sometimes for kilometres. From the roadside all the way across the hills.

Olive oil isn’t simply part of the food here.

It’s part of life.

Families have their own trees. Harvesting begins in winter, and throughout the region you’ll find olive presses and producers.

In an average year, Messinia produces around 50,000–55,000 tonnes of olive oil, a very large proportion of it extra virgin.

The small Koroneiki olive plays the starring role and is famous for the quality of the oil it produces.

And olive oil is certainly nothing new here.

More than 3,000 years ago, it was already important at the Mycenaean Palace of Nestor.

I love that.

The landscape changes. People change.

But some things, apparently, have belonged to Messinia for thousands of years.

And of course, you have to taste the oil.

Not just from a beautiful bottle in a shop. Go to a producer. Smell it. Taste it. Find out when the olives are harvested and why one oil can taste completely different from another.

Want to know more about olive oil ?

Around 50,000–55,000 tonnes produced in an average year
Around 95% of the olive oil produced is extra virgin
Koroneiki – the small olive behind the character of much of Messinia’s olive oil
Around 15 litres of olive oil consumed per person per year

🧿 Wine from Messinia

Perhaps one of its best-kept secrets.

After thirty years of travelling around Greece – and quite a few wine trips along the way – I thought I had a pretty good idea of what makes a wine region interesting.

Messinia surprised me.

The region has had its own Protected Geographical Indication, PGI Messinia, since 1989.

And there’s far more happening here than most people realise.

Greek grape varieties such as Fileri, Assyrtiko and Roditis grow alongside international varieties including Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Merlot.

The region also includes PGI Pylia and PGI Trifilia.

There are some lovely dry whites and reds being made here, and winemakers who are genuinely passionate about putting their region on the wine map.

And naturally, that makes me happy.

I’d much rather take guests to a winemaker who’s standing among his own barrels and starts telling us his story than to an anonymous tasting room processing three busloads a day.

Any day.

Want to know more about the wines from Messinia ?

Since 1989 PGI Messinia
White: Fileri · Assyrtiko · Roditis · Chardonnay · Sauvignon Blanc
Red: Cabernet Sauvignon · Cabernet Franc · Merlot

🧿 Messinia, 365 days a year

Two weeks in August?

Honestly, that’s almost a shame.

This may be one of the things I most want people to understand about Messinia.

You really don’t have to come only in July or August.

There’s spring, when everything is green. May, when it can already be wonderful by the sea. September and October, when the water is still warm but the biggest summer crowds have gone.

Then November and winter, when the olive harvest begins.

And those sunny winter days when the terraces in Pylos suddenly fill up again.

The castles don’t disappear in January. The Palace of Nestor is still there. Ancient Messene may actually be rather more enjoyable when it isn’t 35 degrees.

The winemakers are still making wine.

And the tavernas are once again filled mostly with the people who actually live here.

Messinia doesn’t stop when the tourist season ends.

Life simply carries on.

And perhaps that is exactly what I mean when I talk about the real Greece.

🧿 This is my Messinia

The sea. The olive groves. The wine and the food. The Palace of Nestor and Ancient Messene. Methoni and Koroni. The Venetians. Pylos and the Battle of Navarino.

A coffee in the square.

And a little road when you have absolutely no idea where it ends.

For me, it isn’t any one of those things that makes Messinia special.

It’s that they’re all here together.

After thirty years of travelling through Greece, I’m still curious about what might be around the next corner.

But Messinia is the place where, in the end, I stayed.

And this is the Messinia I’d love you to discover. 🇬🇷💙

Karlien A Liewes