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And double check with your hotel if they’ll be open during your visit. Chances are that a hotel won’t accept your booking if they see that you’re in town when they’re not, but it never hurts to be sure. “It is worth planning around what is genuinely open rather than where you want to go on the map,” Kusak says. “This is where I lean on my team in Greece. They know which properties are running, which restaurants stay open through the winter, and where a January afternoon is best spent. It isn’t information you can always find online, and it changes from year to year.”
Are you, conveniently enough, hoping to spend a January afternoon in Greece? “A January afternoon in Athens is best spent on foot,” Kusak asserts. “I’d wander a few of the neighborhoods—Plaka, Monastiraki, Thisio, Kolonaki—just to get a feel for how the city lives, pausing at a small shop for a warm koulouri or a slice of spanakopita along the way. Then the Acropolis, which in the off-season is blissfully unhurried. With the crowds thinned, there’s room to take it in properly.”
Where (else) to go in Greece in the off season
In the off season, while many places in some smaller islands and destinations may “shut down,” Greece does not close uniformly. Athens, the rest of the mainland, and many of the larger islands carry on much as usual. In addition to Athens, Corfu, Crete, Santorini, and Paros—as recommended by locals we admire and trust—our Top Travel Specialists also gave their own additional recommendations for where to go in Greece in the off season: Thessaloniki and the Peloponnese.
Thessaloniki: Culinary heritage on the Thermaic Gulf
Waterfront Thessaloniki is designated a UNESCO City of Gastronomy, with a dining scene informed by a long history as a crossroads of ancient and modern trade. Given its position in Northern Greece, Thessaloniki has played host to Greeks, Ottoman Turks, Sephardic Jews, Armenians, and Slavs for centuries, resulting in meals and dishes that pull influences from all over the continent. And because Thessaliniki is also the second largest city in Greece, it has more in common with Athens schedule-wise and stays open even after the summer is over.
