Greek Spotlight and Island Explorer - Small Group

You'll arrive in Athens and find antiquity threaded through the city: marble columns beyond cafe tables, temple ruins beside narrow streets and the Acropolis high above the rooftops. After checking in, you can explore the streets at your own pace, perhaps turning into Plaka where pedestrian lanes curl past neoclassical façades and bougainvillea tumbles from balconies. You might catch the roasted scent of Greek coffee from a kafenion or pick up a sesame-crusted koulouri from a bakery. Later, meet your Travel Director and fellow travellers, ready to begin twelve days together in Greece.

With your Local Specialist beside you, you'll make the climb to the Acropolis, the Parthenon waiting at the summit in pale marble as Athens stretches far below. From there, you'll move through the city’s great classical landmarks, following the long curve of the Panathenaic Stadium, passing the surviving columns of the Temple of Olympian Zeus and slipping beneath the clean stone lines of Hadrian’s Arch. At the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, pause as the Evzones perform their ceremonial change, the hard strike of nail-studded tsarouchia sounding across the paving while white pleats sway and red caps flash against the stone. At Vryssaki Art Cafe, settle into the terrace for something sweet, with the Acropolis framed above the rooftops. Then leave Athens behind and peer down into the Corinth Canal, its narrow ribbon of water cut deep between sheer rock walls. In Nafplio, the evening is yours. Perhaps choose an Optional Experience to look up towards Palamidi Castle, out across the harbour to Bourtzi Fortress and towards the Sleeping Lion carved into the rock before sharing dinner at a family-run local restaurant.

Start with ancient Mycenae, where your Local Specialist unpacks a world of royal tombs, mighty ruins and Bronze Age drama that did not come to play. Then swap warrior kings for winged workers at Axion Esti, a family-run organic beekeeping facility in Stemnitsa. This MAKE TRAVEL MATTER® Experience is sweet, hands-on and properly local. Meet Sophia and Anthony, zip into beekeeper gear, get close to the hives, nose around the museum and taste honey straight from the source while learning why these tiny pollinators are big-time ecosystem heroes. After all that buzz, grab lunch in Mycenae your way before the road calls again. This afternoon, continue to Delphi and settle in for a free evening in this storied mountain town.

Along Delphi’s Sacred Way, you'll climb with your Local Specialist towards the Temple of Apollo, the path winding higher across the hillside with the vast olive groves of Amfissa spread out below. This was the road to the Oracle, once trod by Alexander the Great before setting outo to conquer the known world. As you continue through the sanctuary with your Local Specialist, you’ll hear how athletes once competed here alongside musicians and poets in the Pythian Games, all in honour of Apollo. Perhaps choose an Optional Experience and take your seat for a hosted lunch at a local restaurant, passing plates across the table before continuing north. At Thermopylae, beneath the slopes of Mount Kallidromos, you’ll look across the broad plain that today covers what was once a narrow passage between mountain and sea, held by King Leonidas and his Spartans. Then continue through central Greece to Kalambaka for dinner at your hotel.

At Meteora, you’ll travel with your Local Specialist into a landscape of sheer sandstone pillars, with monasteries set so high above Kalambaka that stone and sky seem stitched together. Visit one of these 14th-century retreats and move through its stone-built spaces, then look back towards Kalambaka from a height monks once reached only by rope and ladder. Hear how people and provisions were hauled up the rock face, suspended between the ground below and the monastery above. Later, return to Athens with the rest of the day free to spend your way. This evening, perhaps choose an Optional Experience and gather at a taverna with your new friends, where traditional Greek dishes and drinks pass around the table and you might find yourself on the dance floor before the night is over.

The high-speed ferry leaves Athens behind and carries you across the Aegean to Mykonos. After transferring to your hotel, join a short walking orientation before choosing your own route through the island. In Chora, cobalt shutters cut through the white of the houses, wooden balconies lean above narrow stone-paved lanes and small chapels sit between them. Follow whichever turn tempts you, perhaps towards the waterfront, perhaps further into the tangle of streets. Or choose an Optional Experience with a Local Specialist and explore Chora through its food, tasting local favourites from stop to stop as you hear the stories behind what’s on your plate. The rest of Mykonos is yours, with time for another turning, another sip and as much of the Aegean as you care to seek out.

Leave Chora behind and cross Mykonos’s dry interior on an Optional Island Tour, where low stone walls and pale hills lead you towards Ano Mera. You'll step inside the 16th-century monastery of Panagia Tourliani and take in its richly carved wooden icon screen, crowded with gilded detail and painted saints. From the village, you'll continue towards the coast and some of Mykonos’s Blue Flag beaches. Walk down to the sand, wade into the Aegean and swim with the white curve of the beach behind you. Afterwards, the island is yours again, whether you stay by the water or head back towards town.

A final morning in Mykonos is yours before you board the ferry for Naxos, with the Aegean stretching between one island and the next. Once ashore, you'll join an orientation through Naxos Town, moving from the harbour into the old quarter where Venetian stonework, arched passages and the Kastro sit above the waterfront. With the rest of the day free, you might stay near the harbour, listening to the water lap against the quay as you follow the waterfront, or turn inland towards the old quarter and follow the arched stone passages beneath the Kastro. This evening, perhaps choose an Optional Experience and join a Naxian cooking lesson. Roll up your sleeves and cook alongside your hosts.

Today, Naxos is yours to explore at your own pace, from the streets of town to the Aegean beyond the shore. Perhaps begin in town, browsing the small shops before heading for the shore and wading into the Aegean, where the beach falls quiet behind you as you swim beyond the shallows. Maybe you'll choose a seaside taverna and share lunch as boats drift across the bay. Or choose an Optional Experience and travel deeper into Naxos, leaving the seafront for mountain country where olive trees, vines and fruit groves fill fertile valleys between traditional villages. Watch the landscape change around you as the road climbs inland, then return with the rest of the day still yours.

Across the Aegean, you’ll hear the low thrum of the ferry as Santorini’s dark volcanic cliffs fill the horizon, crowned by white villages high above the water. After checking in, follow the edge of the caldera and look down into its immense blue basin, with cave houses cut into the rock and church domes punctuating the cliffs. This evening, perhaps choose an Optional Experience and taste Santorini wines grown in volcanic soil, crisp and mineral on the palate. Then continue to Oia, where narrow passages weave between cave houses and old Captains’ mansions, blue domes sit above the caldera and the last light softens the white façades around you.

Today, you can trace Santorini’s Bronze Age past beyond the caldera. Choose the Santorini Island Tour Optional Experience and walk into Akrotiri, following Bronze Age streets between houses, stairways and enormous storage jars preserved beneath volcanic ash for thousands of years. Continue to Megalochori, where cobbled paths slip between old houses, elaborate church towers and vineyards beyond the village. Or spend the day on the water aboard a catamaran, sailing through the caldera before diving in for a swim and slipping on a snorkel while shafts of light break across the water above you. This evening, return to Oia and make your way through its marble-paved streets as the sun descends behind the Aegean.

Your Greek journey ends in Santorini today as you say goodbye to your Travel Director and fellow travellers. After nine days of ancient sites, island crossings and shared experiences, it’s time to head home with plenty of memories to take with you.