Exploring the Aegean 2011: Halkidiki - Mount Athos & the Akti Monesteries

Halkidiki is the three fingered hand at the top of the Aegean. The Easternmost finger is the Akti peninsula that terminates in Mount Athos - "the Holy Mountain". The whole peninsula is administered semi-independently by the Greek Orthodox church - and boats containing women are not allowed to approach closer that 500M or to moor (not that there are any good anchorages anyway). Despite this rather medieval prohibition, we wanted to see the monasteries which are truly spectacular.
Getting around the peninsula in one day is quite a challenge. It's 60 miles round and in any sort of a wind, there are ferocious gusts and vicious seas around Mount Athos (which is 4000M high).
Coming from Thasos, we needed supplies so we decided to go via Kovalla then Ierisos. Unfortunately the huge harbour at Kavalla seemed to be completely taken up with private moorings. The port police didn't respond on VHF and there didn't seem to be anyone around to ask. In the end, we gave up and went to Iraklitsa where the pilot indicated we could probably get a berth. No chance! it was chokka with local boats. We tried anchoring off the beach but the sand was so soft we dragged twice. So off to Eleftheria with the stress level beginning to rise.
We arrived at sunset and tried to anchor in the South bay but the anchor wouldn't hold in the soft mud and weed so we decamped to the rather industrial concrete quay on the north cove. We took half an hour tying up alongside among the fishermen. Just as we were sitting down to a well-earned Sundowner, a bloke on a motorbike rocked up and warned us that a fleet of large trawlers were due in at 0400 and would probably require us to move. He told us that the left hand cove across the bay has much better holding that the right. After humming and hawing, we cast off and raced against the darkness to get to the cove, dropped the hook and prayed. It stuck!

Next day we crossed to Ierissa at the base of Akti. We moored stern too in a suspiciously empty corner of the quay. Sure enough, a couple of hours later, the wind blew up and threw a vicious slop into just that bit. Aaaaargh! Luckily we were able to anchor and swing in the opposite corner of the harbour. Lindsay yomped into the town and found a supermarket and a Liddle but it was about 4 miles round trip so she was knackered. In the evening we went off and anchored in Ormos Plati which is theoretically part of Akti and so off limits to women but nobody was checking and we had a peaceful night with amazing phosphorescence.

St basil castle. Part of inland Hilandar monastery

Next morning we were off at first light to get round the whole peninsula. The winds were too light or on the nose or both all day so we had to do the whole 60 mile trip on motor. It took over two hours to get to the first castle but from then on it was another monastery every hour. They really are amazing - more like Tibet than Greece. Many are nearly 1000 years old.
Life appears not to be quite as mediaeval as they would like you to think. We saw several 4*4s and trucks presumably doing jobs around the estate and several monasteries were undergoing repairs using modern scaffolding and tower cranes.
We bailed out of the last couple of Monasteries on the Western side as we didn't want to get to our chosen anchorage "Diapora" in the dark.

Here are just a few of of our pictures of the Monasteries and hermitages as we went around...