Agistri Island Greece The Overlooked Greek Getaway Just One Hour from Athens

Agistri Island Greece The Overlooked Greek Getaway Just One Hour from Athens

Christian and Karen visit Agistri, a lesser-known Greek island only an hour from Athens. The vlog captures their reunion and first impressions of this overlooked destination, reached via low-cost flights from Sydney through Singapore and Athens.

The Greek Island Everyone Overlooks (only 1 hour from Athens!). | Transcript:

My name is Christian and welcome to my channel. It's crazy. It's been a long time since I filmed a real travel vlog in a completely new destination. I'm on the island of Agistri, in Greece, with Karen. The group is reunited again. Ah, I don't even know how to express how good it is to be here. Basically, I'm returning to Sydney after a period in the UK and, as I've been doing a lot lately, I booked everything with low-cost airlines. So, I took a connecting flight between Sydney, Singapore, and Athens with Scoot. And then I just needed to make the trip between Athens and London on my own or with another airline. And then I thought: "You know what? Since I'm going to pass through Athens anyway, why not take advantage of it

to have a short break, an extended layover?" And of course, I called Karen and said, "I want to spend a few days on vacation in Greece. Where should we go from Athens?" We did a little research on what was near Athens and in the Saronic Islands. After doing some research, we concluded that Agistri would be the best island for us to visit because it's authentic, small enough to get around by motorbike, has beautiful beaches, isn't too expensive, and has small taverns, which was exactly what we wanted. So, yesterday, we both flew to Athens, Karen from Holland and me from London. We arrived late, so we spent the night near Monastiraki.

Mona, Monastiraki, Monastiraki, which is located right in the center of the city. And so, this morning, we took a ferry for just 1 hour to the island of Agistri. So, welcome. I'm going to record everything we do over the next 3 days and 2 nights on video. And I'm very excited. I don't have Greece included in my phone plan. Normally, I wouldn't have access to data here. This brings me perfectly to today's video sponsors, Saily. Because I was looking for an eSIM. I wanted to have information as soon as I arrived in Greece so I could contact Karen, to start researching where we would go in Agistri and how to get to our accommodation. It is very important for me, at this moment, to have access to

data as soon as I arrive, even before disembarking in a country. I don't need to waste time going to a carrier store as soon as I arrive. I don't need to go through the trouble of dealing with physical chips, swapping them out in my cell phone. I don't need to do that anymore. I just went straight to Saily and typed in Greece. I got 5 GB for 4 days and I hope that's enough. It should be quiet, but I can recharge if I need to. The great thing about Saily is that you only need to download the eSIM once, which I've done before. After that, you literally just add data for the country you're going to, and it 's already activated. So, buying data literally takes about 20 seconds. It's the most convenient way to get data when you're abroad.

So, download the Saily app now if you haven't already, it's totally free, and you can get an exclusive 15% discount on all data plans using my code backpacking, or you can go directly to saily.com/backpacking. We arrived at the Port of Scala, which I believe is the main port of arrival for ferries here on the island of Aegina. Around 10 am. We walked to our accommodation, but of course it was too early to check in. So we left our bags and now we've come to Skala beach, which is the local beach and it's simply wonderful. The water is crystal clear. We are very, very happy to be back in a warm place where the water is like this. And behind us there are some very cute taverns. So, at some point, we'll have

lunch here. What do you want to eat, Karen? Anything Greek. We are at a scooter rental shop. There are several on the island; we did some research during our walk around town earlier and decided to come to Moto Skala, a scooter rental place. It costs 20 euros for 24 hours for a 50cc motorcycle, but I've found that my UK driving license is no longer sufficient. But luckily, I recently took my motorcycle license test in Australia, so they were able to accept that license. Actually, looking more closely, even my Australian motorcycle license wasn't enough for them, and he said, "If you want to use this one, you'll need an international driver's license." But then Karen, who does n't even plan on driving the motorcycle, got her Dutch driver's license, like,

for cars, and he said, "Oh yeah, we can use this one." Basically, we were able to rent the motorcycle using Karen's European Union driver's license, even though I'll be the one driving it. But they didn't see a problem with that. As long as you are from the European Union; Otherwise, if you are from abroad, you need an international driver's license. And we'll be safe, which is what mattered to them. Yes, it's 20 euros for 24 hours. So, we paid 40 euros to have it for the next 48 hours, which is how long we'll be on the island. While we were there, we received a call from our accommodation, Koukari Apartments, saying that our room was ready. So, this is where we're staying.

It is just a 5-10 minute walk from the ferry port in Skala. We have a big, beautiful bed. We have a table area that we leave quite dirty, or rather, not dirty at all. It's already a mess. We have our sink area. Oh, we also have an iron and a hair dryer. A little space for hanging clothes. And we have a shower stall and the toilet right there. each. And this was one of the best value-for-money options we found. But, you know, it seemed decent. I think there were some cheaper ones that didn't look very good. But we have air conditioning. And that was one of our requirements.

We thought: we are literally in Greece, in the middle of summer. We're going to need air conditioning. But the place is beautiful and the people are very friendly. Yes, that's great. It also has good reviews. This place? Yes. So, our first beach is the most adventurous of them all. It's a hike, an uphill climb, and there are "no entry" signs, but we just spoke to a girl and she said, " Well, there are a lot of people there." So, let's go. This complicates things. This is a true free camping spot, which is pretty amazing. This is the path to the campsite, which is pretty amazing. This is the way down. That's crazy.

I only refrained from taking the camera away because I had just seen a man's penis. So, I think it might be a bit of a nudist beach as well. I forgot to tell you that it is. Oh, you knew that? I completely forgot. Oh, I didn't know. It's very difficult to walk here. And this here is Skiliry Beach, which we passed on the way, but we decided not to go there because there are too many people in a very small space, actually. This appears to be a sandy beach. Oh, yes. There aren't that many stones. Okay, it 's almost 6 PM. We're back home and getting ready to go out to dinner. This sounds like such a

good hobby. Like, I don't know, you know when you take a shower, eat snacks on the balcony in the air conditioning, put on makeup to go out to dinner. These are such good summer vacation vibes. I'm wearing a new Anthropologie shirt, which made me super excited, because I was telling Karen that I don't have any nice shirts. All my blouses are super casual. So, yeah, that's really cool. And Karen is wearing a lovely new dress from Bershka. I had just put a bunch of flower hair clips in my hair, and then I forgot that I would have to put on my helmet afterwards to go back. So, I took them all again. So that's Reese's whistle?

Actually, it's quite close to the beaches where we were earlier. It's great to have the scooter and just go for a few short rides. It takes less than 5 minutes to get to each place. This means we don't get as sweaty from having to walk the whole way. But many people are walking down the street. And you know what? Congratulations to them. But that's not the case for us, not on this vacation. We travel very well together, Karen. AND.

We were talking about the fact that one of the many reasons we love traveling together is that we both have a good eye for photography and taking pictures of each other, which is lovely. Hmm, but none of our boyfriends have one. And so Karen is slowly training her boyfriend. Me too, slowly. Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. Ah. Oh, wow. Oh, people are just relaxing. Oh, that's stunning. Tonight we came for a spaghetti special. We ordered a shrimp spaghetti and a vegetarian one, and we're going to share both. I'm excited. We ordered a flat white. She got a cappuccino freddo. And they're lovely, but my only complaint is the amount of foam they have.

Now, any Greek will tell you to try a spanakopita, which is basically a spinach and cheese pastry. Bougatsa. That looks sweet. Is it sweet? It's like a puff pastry filled with cream, powdered sugar, and cinnamon. Today we are going to the other side of the island. We are now in Megalochori, which is where the Med Sailors boat docks. If you take the Med Sailors Saronic route on a Thursday, you'll stop at this port in Megalochori. So that 's cool. Karen and I have been here before. It only takes us 3 minutes to get here from Skala, and we're going to the completely opposite side of the island because there's a peninsula. Hmm, is it a peninsula? It's like another island. Ah, water.

We reached the other side of the island and it only took us 13 minutes to get here on our motorbike, at a maximum speed of 40 km per hour. Oh, it was such a lovely drive through pine trees, along winding, empty roads. So, this is Aponisos. It's like an island connected to Aegistry. Look how beautiful. My God, it looks like Gatorade water. The entrance fee to the island is 6 euros per person, but you can use any of the sun loungers or anything else on the island. Karen is at, uh.Karen is with the card machine. We use Splitwise. Karen is not just my "sugar mama" on the weekend. So, that would be lovely. I think so. So, there's this button here.

Yes. You press it and you can ask. to stop. Someone will come to your deck chair. And how much does it cost? Is it expensive? No. 7 euros for a gin. It's not exactly cheap, but. it 's not outrageously expensive. How much does half a liter of Frappuccino cost? That's what I really want to know. Okay, this is a sad reality, he just said that if we wanted the better sun loungers at the front, it would cost 10 euros more. You get the metallic blue ones included in the price, but that's okay, we can still use the doorbell. What a place, so this is the bar on the island of Aponisos. Oh, and you can see all the

boats; I think when we did the Med Sailors tour years ago, our boat must have definitely stopped at some of these bays around here. This place is like the daytime bar on the island, with very few people around. Oh, they have more flotation equipment. Then we found one of the surfboards. Or is it a stand-up paddleboard? It must be a stand-up paddleboard, just relaxing in the middle of this super blue sea here. And we've been trying to record TikToks, probably without much success, but I'm excited to see what comes of it. There are many more people arriving on the island now. I don't know what time it is. What time is it, Karen?

Oh, I have no idea. It's probably around noon. That's my guess. Yes, more and more groups have been coming here. We assume they are day-trippers. People who came from Athens and then came here. But we're glad we arrived when we did. I think it's spacious enough that you don't feel cramped. Yeah, it has a lot of sun loungers, doesn't it Especially from the other side. These are the best ones. Oh, no. A hot dog for 4 euros. Mykonos would never do that. I imagine the sun sets here. Oh, it must be so beautiful. He says it only opens at 8 PM. The sun sets around 8:45 PM here.

Here's another very chic blouse. Another one from Anthropology. Very young. I'm very excited about this. Karen is wearing a beautiful outfit in blue and cream. And we can actually confirm that they will definitely be there tonight, the Med Sailors team, because some girls who were sitting next to us in Alonissos recognized us from the Med Sailors videos. And I can't believe you're here. We were like: Here we are back on Aegina Street. Nine years. No, eight years. Eight years after we were originally here on that Med Sailors trip. Then we came to a restaurant called Stelios in Megalochori.

We wanted to eat outside and asked to move to the outside area as soon as they had a free table. Because look over there, isn't it lovely? So, we are in Megalochori. This is where we're staying. And that's where we went today. So, that's how we drive. Here we are. We're counting on it as soon as it becomes available. Someone in the Google Maps reviews actually recommended this place. Zucchini fritters are seemingly out of this world. And then this is a huge pile of tzatziki. It cost 5 euros, which is more or less what we normally pay, but not for a portion of tzatziki this size. AND. And she was like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah." Me:

Yes, that's true. Normally, I would order gyros for lunch, but it seemed like the right thing to order at this particular restaurant. So, uh, how good is that? So, this is a pork gyros, and I said without onions, but with lettuce . But you said to keep the onion and remove the lettuce. Very good. Very, very good. It's the most famous bar. We are literally reliving everything that would have happened about 8 years ago today, and the chaos of that night. Let's just say that we were both single at the time. That's all you need to know about it. And you know they have very well-stocked refrigerators. Oh, really?

Yes, they have duck terrines and everything. Oh, how wonderful is that? Good morning guys. It's our last morning in Agistri. We'll take the ferry back to Athens this afternoon, but of course we want to do one last sightseeing tour. We're not leaving until 3 PM, and we still have our scooter until 2 PM. So, there was one last beach in Agistri that we thought we had to visit. Its name is Dragonera. Literally 10 minutes by motorbike from Skala, if that. The water is sparkling. It's crystal clear. It's a very rocky beach here, which I don't actually hate, because the water is usually clearer where there are only rocks. It's a bit

cloudier today. Still, it's beautiful. checked into our hotel, the Seven Athens, right in the middle of the city. Yes, it's not cheap, but it's perfectly good, and the fact that it's right in the city center, less than a 5- minute walk from Monastiraki station, is priceless. Yes, there it is. Seven Athens. So, what time is it now, Karen? 5:30? Yes, and I said let's have dinner and she said no, let's have dinner twice. Let's grab some feta cheese wrapped in puff pastry with honey and sesame seeds, which is our favorite thing to eat in Greece. And we couldn't find it on Agiou Street

. So, we're going to a specific restaurant that we think exists in Athens. So, let's eat this and have some wine now. We have to make the most of our time in Athens and do it in style How cute is that? What is the name of this square? Oh, I don't know the name of the square, but I know the neighborhood is Psiri. Psiri? Psiri, something like that. It's very popular. Yes, the fact that we just left and this happened is lovely. Look at this whole atmosphere. Outdoor dining. I'm curious: is it a very touristy area? What are we seeing? To be fair, 12 euros for a moussaka isn't much different from most restaurants on

Agiou Street. Well, this is.this is. It's a delusion. Yes, it's a long way to the restaurant. The name of this is Alice in Cowland. Little Couk. That's very funny. That's why we came here, love. Yes Oh, look at that. Just look. Just look. Why don't they serve this in more places? I don't know. We're obsessed with it. It's the best thing about Greek cuisine. Mmm. It is good. Mmm. That's the one. It's the meaning: the saltiness of the butter, the sweetness of the honey, the crispness of the filo pastry, and the softness of the cheese. It's.it's harmony.

You heard it here just now. Uh-huh. How beautiful. Guys, the last hour was crazy. I had booked an appointment to get my nails done after eating feta wrapped in filo pastry, and while we were on our way to the salon, the sky opened up. It hadn't rained here for about 3 months, then a storm came, the streets turned into rivers, and it was pretty crazy. So, we took refuge in a really nice restaurant and ordered some wine, which is why you might think I drank a little, because I did. But then I had to take it in a disposable cup because I had an appointment. So, we have a beautiful new look. I opted for a short pastel orange. And while I was gone, Karen started talking to one of the other customers in the

restaurant, and he. his name is Andreas, shout out to him. He's from Greece, and also half South African. And he's an actor in a local open-air theater here in Greece. But it's like a really cool comedy piece about ancient Greek stories . The show is called "Medea and other friends I made in Athens". So, he's an actor in it, but it was cancelled because of the rain. So, he ended up going into that restaurant as well, just to have a beer. But he showed us this beautiful viewpoint in Athens. Look at this. That is the Acropolis. Look at that beautiful view. It's incredible. This is a great place to get high. We spent three days without finding a kataifi in all of Agistri. And at our second restaurant in Athens,

another one has already appeared. So, we ordered again. I have some on my phone. It is very good. Oh, wonderful. Karen, you're going to love this place

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