The Spring 2026 Special Skiathos Newsletter:
The Special Skiathos Spring 2026 Newsletter
Hello & welcome to this rather special Spring Newsletter (I’ll come to the “special” part a bit later).
We have had yet another mild winter. Quite a lot of rain which has been good for the water table, but no real cold at all. Here in Zorbathes, we have only had a couple of decent frosts, & we are a frost pocket, which helps to keep us a tad cooler in the summer. Why would we want some serious cold, you might wonder. Well, cold (& snow) kills of a lot of the “bugs” & mosquitoes. & is generally good for many of the fruit trees. Olives love a bit of cold! Not too much of course. In Pelion, there are definite “tree lines. Olives from the sea until a certain height, then apples, & finally beech & chestnut trees in the higher, colder climes. We hope it won’t be as hot this summer as last, but the general trend is for the climate to give us milder winters & hotter summers. Not so good!
What’s been going on in Skiathos? This year all the beach businesses have come up for auction. All the watersports’ businesses have remained under the same ownership, & according to what we hear, the beach “Cantinas” (tavernas) have remained under the same ownership as well (about which we are very glad). Only some of the umbrella concessions have changed hands. We hope that they will keep the prices for the umbrellas & two beach chairs reasonable.
There has been an ongoing debate about the businesses along the waterfront on the way to the airport (Bakaliko, Akroyiali, Scuna, etc.) because their outside sitting areas (built over the sea) are, & have been for many years, illegal. The Municipal Council of Skiathos made an official intervention to the Members of Parliament of Magnesia and the Ministry of National Economy & Finance, sending a letter regarding the application of Law 5092/2024 to the island’s coastal businesses. While acknowledging that the sitting areas are illegal (fines have been charged for all the years that they existed), time should be given for these businesses to adjust to the possible fact that they can no longer use these areas. A year was suggested. Part of the attraction of Greece is the ability to sit right next to the sea, eating, drinking, & just enjoying life! (See my new book, “Tsipouro Tales“.) I have a suggestion: let the Municipality build official extensions to that seashore & then let the businesses rent the space. Surely this would be a win-win?
There has been an incredible amount of building this last winter. Many (rather ugly) square, concrete, buildings have been erected in Town, sacrificing the aesthetic of the old Town houses for a maximum of rentable space. Rather a pity, I think. Also, outside the Town plan, buildings are popping up like mushrooms. In the meanwhile, local people cannot afford to buy a house anymore, or even find a property to rent, as everything is built for potential tourist rental. Workers who come for the summer season, including policemen/women, firemen/women, waiters, chefs, teachers, doctors, medical staff, etc. cannot find anywhere to rent at prices they can afford. Tourism has brought many advantages to Skiathos, but it is a double-edged sword. Skiathos lost a lot of its soul & is now pricing its own residents out of the housing market. Hopefully, some reasonable balance will be achieved soon. Similar situations have arisen in very touristic places like Amsterdam, Barcelona, Venice, & so forth.
We have finally bitten the bullet & bought an all-electric car. Chinese, of course (a BYD), as the Chinese are the only ones building quality EV’s at a reasonable price (even with the import tariffs). Lida was sad to say goodbye to her Toyota Yaris Hybrid, but it is time to move on. We sold the car to a friend, so she is happy that it has gone to a good home. This new car is so smart, we are having to dumb it down so that we can understand the controls & drive it without it talking to us all the time. The build quality is outstanding &, from the short time we have been driving it, it will only cost us pennies to get to Skiathos Town & back. Also, fully charged, it will take us into Town & back at least 7 times (probably more) as the fully charged range is well over 200 kilometers. Ideal for a small island like Skiathos. During the summer, we hope to charge it from our photovoltaics system, thus providing us with free transport!!
Apparently, in the EU plus the UK, fully electric cars are now outselling ICE cars (& that includes hybrids & plug in hybrids as they are also ICE cars). About time! The tipping point has come & we might just be on a good path. I hope so.
And now for the “Special” part of the newsletter – I have written a second book about Skiathos, “Tsipouro Tales” and made a brand-new website to sell it (& my previous book, “Lucky to be Here”). Both can be brought as print books, Kindle books, & EPUB’s. A third book is in the works. However, the web site: https://skiathosstories.com/
is not only for my books. You can also buy many books about Skiathos, written by Alexandros Papadiamantis, Richard Romanus, & others. Also, books about the Sporades Islands & Greece, & guides & maps for the islands & Greece. A section tells you about Skiathos bookshops, & other places where print books about Skiathos (including my own) can be bought in Skiathos Town. Other sections are for reading accessories, & instructions about how to self-publish (everyone has a book in them!). One book that I can thoroughly recommend is a coffee table book of beautiful photos of Skiathos & its residents, by Jason Kofinas. This book has been a labour of love & it shows!
I have also shifted my web pages for our Villas in Zorbathes Valley to this site, to consolidate my Skiathos Stories in one place:
https://skiathosstories.com/zorbathes-villas/
We are still only taking bookings from previous guests (who respect what we offer here) or via recommendations from people we trust. So, if you would like to stay with us, enjoy peace & quiet & natural beauty, you will need to get a recommendation from someone! We earn a lot less money this way, but we do have peace of mind, & at our age, peace of mind is worth more than most things!
Finally, a BYD car story:
So, we go to Volos to pick up the car, & we get to the showroom at 09:00 (‘cos we are keen, right?). No one there!!!
Finally, at 10:00 the guy we are waiting for turns up.
It seems that he is actually not making any money from the sale – the salesman in Athens (who we never met, just emailed constantly) was getting all the commission.
Anyway, this guy was very nice, showed us the car & tried to explain everything in 5 minutes (it’s a very complicated little car!).
I had been told that we could not go on the ferry if the battery was over 40% full, but he had kindly taken the trouble to charge it fully! SHIT!!
I said, well let’s discharge it then, but he didn’t know how to do that (if it is even possible?).
He suggested that we should drive it to Larissa & back, & that might use up enough battery.
We really didn’t want to do that but eventually agreed thinking that maybe we’d go past IKEA for a cheap lunch at the very least.
We drove for 25 meters but couldn’t figure out how to turn down the heating (it was going full blast), so Lida went back & dragged the guy out to explain at least how that worked.
Finally, we get on the main road for Larissa from Volos, which connects with the motorway after some 10 k’s.
The car is fine, quiet, & easy to drive.
BUT we get halfway to Larissa, & tractors had blocked the motorway because the farmers are striking (!) so we had to get off it, drive through some very rutted roads (Lida freaking out) until we could get on the old road from Volos to Larissa.
It’s only a 2-lane road & all the heavy traffic going both ways is on it!
Finally, we get the battery down to around 75% & we start back – all the way on the old road.
As we approach Volos, we still have 50% battery (rats!), so we take the Volos bypass & go along the Pelion coast a ways until we find a nice taverna on the sea.
After a delicious tsipouro & fish lunch, we drive back to the Volos Harbour car park, where we leave the car, STILL at 46%.
By this time, I am thinking, well they can’t make too much fuss on the ferry, & if they do, I’ll just throw a wobbler! What the hell!
(In Greece, as a last resort, burst into tears! It works every time but is definitely a last resort!)
Next morning, very early, Lida walks on to the ferry, & I drive the car on, & nobody says NUFFIN!
Typically Greek!
When we got back to Zorbathes (Lida still hasn’t driven it as this point), she decides that our road is too rough, & the car has been in its garage pretty much ever since.
We will get the road fixed & then she will drive it. It’s an automatic, like her Yaris Hybrid, so she won’t have any problem.
We only have one key & the salesman in Athens said there is no spare! What he didn’t bother to explain is that when I downloaded the BYD app, I can open the car with my phone, so now we (kinda) have a spare.
Hey, hey. So it goes in Greece.
That’s it for now. I hope many of you will be coming back to experience the beautiful nature and wonderful sandy beaches of Skiathos this summer.
Regards,
Geof.