Stunning Koroni, Peloponnese, Greece

so welcome to the Southwest peloponnese I've come down here specifically because lots of people say to me where should we go in the peloponnese beaches for Greek Resorts and so on and the simple answer is Southwest peloponnese so we're going to have a look around today we're starting here in Corona which you can see behind me and then I will drive up the west coast and that will be another video so I hope you enjoy this see Corona is here beautiful color see today and it's set as I said down in the south of the Philippines you can see over here we have beautiful view of the peloponnese and Corona itself has a Byzantine Castle we're going to go up there in a minute and probably start there and then the town is arranged around this little Cove here you can't see it but there are two beaches there's one down below us and then there's another one on the other side of this hill called zaga Beach which is probably the best beach but I think we'll probably go up to the castle and then when the way down into town and have a little look at what coroning has to offer from about 83 we reckonel to about 1991 my wife used to stay here in Corona and they used to stay in this house here on the top floor and she and her sister used to parade as they would say or Promenade um every summer from basically beginning to the end of August and you can see near the castle on the hills with the castle in a few minutes when we pop up there buys an Italian Castle dating originally from about 600 A.D um although what we see here is rather newer extremely hot and humid here you you're dripping in sweat as she and her sister to walk up and down the street with their friends um I think probably trying to attract the boys at the time was that right Ellie with a Mad Hat um but it didn't change much apparently Pizzeria is still here from the 80s maybe it's changed name maybe it's changed owners but it was always a pizzeria now it's traditional little town if you want to come to an island vibe in Mainland Greece I would suggest Southwest but it's really really nice and the road does a little loop it's not a huge place it comes down here towards us then we go up to the left Round the back and background again and you can see in the distance the road disappearing off up the hill it is so my wife says that in August this place is absolutely packed mainly with Greek tourists other people as well but she's having a bit of a memory lane at the moment rather enjoying it I think I guess when you come to somewhere for seven or eight years every year um it's amazing this shop used to be a bar called pantalisi's bar that my wife used to go to quite a lot now you can see it's a shop and there are nice shops here definitely not a bar she's a bit upset about she's got him to explore why it's no longer a bar it's been used to be a bar you can see it yeah it would be a bar again for July and August so my wife is a good memory mix of shops pastry shops bars and restaurants along yeah very nice I bet in the sun was packed so apart from the rock pool that we just looked at a couple of minutes ago that my wife used to use there are two beaches there's a lesser Beach over here which apparently is quite nice in the summer and then there's zaga Beach which we'll have to drive to it's only a couple of minutes over the hill the other side of the castle but you can see around here beautiful beautiful Bay I have to say it's beautiful and the color of the seed is just magical everywhere in the peloponnese you see references to the Greek revolution of 1821 here Heroes of the Revolution Local Heroes of the revolution and a rather nice Church in the little square here and you can see the street as I said comes around the back and runs down again it's not one way although it may look even here beginning of may now um there are tourists here maybe not children so much but there are foreign tourists here and I'd really recommend coming down here if you like coming off the Beaten Track Corona is a great place to come for a couple of days and explore the southwest and the west of the Philippines the supermarket here apparently used to be a Bookshop where my wife would spend loads of time looking through the books and the comics that they sold here she's really on memory lane at the moment I'm just trying to make a video but really I should let her do it see a sign to Kalamata here Kalamata is about an hour's drive it's only about 50 55 kilometers but it's twisty turny Road and if you want to come here from Athens you really need a car I would highly recommend coming in a car public transport down here really doesn't exist not in a way that you can use as tourists anyway and it's about three and a half hours drive but it's a good drive it's an easy drive down to Kalamata very easy two and a half hours and then an hour from Kalamata itself Corona is obviously built on a hill the coastline around here is not flat but it's off the charm they look after the place they know their Market if it's not keen on Hills unlike me I love Hills and I love exploring if you Drive apparently we should have driven up the castle but then we'd miss all of this and it's totally pointless gotta walk as always she's going for a coffee I'm going to the castle so she never used to come up here because she was under 18. why would you come up here often there's a church here often you find a little grave outside the church and it's usually to the priest who founded or built the church although I say founded and built typically it was the people who funded it the peace priest just took the money for it and the thing with Greek Villages like this one all over the country you've got to have lots of churches I always think being a priest is probably one of the best jobs in Greece guaranteed employment good place of work and most importantly you don't pay taxes if you're a priest it's tax free to you so it's a pretty Christian number really you have the entrance to the castle it's actually a very easy climb and she don't need to you just head towards it and head up I took a slightly roundabout row but it doesn't matter um you can see big blocks of stone here and to other casts I've been to where I've also made a very small stance yeah Big Blocks of stone very defensive so this is a big castle actually and surprising time castle it dates from about 12 10. although there had been fortifications up here before probably even an acropolis from ancient times the castle that we see now was built was built very much by the venetians so the venetians had a particular interest in this place and for good reason here we are over here in the far far far distance and I hope I can get it on camera over this parabit of the council we have Kalamata I don't know if you can see that in the distance that's Kalamata and then to the right of it Mount tegatus this large mountain here and the other side of Mount tegatus we have Sparta but then as we scroll around to the right we go down into the Lawless and beautiful Manny Peninsula and I have various videos on the many Peninsula now but anyway back to coronium why this Castle exists the venetians used to have trading routes which came past the end of Manny and then passed the end of this part of the peloponnese where karoni and mythonia and the problem was for them in the 11th and 12th centuries that this place was Riven with pirates and they needed to deal with that because it was causing them economic distress so what happened and I'm going to walk along here and hopefully not fall off what happened was that they decided they had to take control of the peloponnese so the venations the very first place they came was Corona here and Corona itself I don't know the derivation of the name but Corona apart from being on obvious disease in Greek means crown and I would imagine that caroni was called coroni because it was considered to be if you like the crown jewel of the venetians and the peloponnese and anyway they came here first let's see it's beautiful see there the color they came here first and they used this as a staging point to conquer effectively developing these which they then held for 200 years and they built here this fortification this Castle to defend their interests and in particular their trading routes which is why this exists and it's a big fortification a big castle you can see it's gonna be a fantastic view of Concordia as we come out here as well at least give you an idea of the coastline here and the Mamma Mia boat down there could be an island you really could be in an island if you want to come somewhere in the mainland Greece which feels like an island but it's not an island come here come to Southwest coroni is just beautiful here you can see it fabulous we're the coastline here as I said going around to Calum after about 30 so kilometers in the distance across the sea the color of the beautiful water there there's Kalamata in the far distance and the castle we're just going to walk up there so I can at least have a look at the end so I'm not going to go any further along here because half disappears but I'm a little bit it's about dogs and snakes take me snakes the dogs can be nasty as well but you can see highly defensive obviously through canons there many years ago must be your way in there just the beauty of the sea color of the water here where my wife used to swim when she was a kid absolutely fabulous the venetians came here they built this castle and they held the peloponnese until a war started with the ottoman in about 4085 the Ottomans having decided that they wanted Greece for themselves and gradually over 15 or so years the Ottomans conquered grease from the venetians with Corona being about the last place to fall in about 14 in about 1500 in fact it was 1500 and the Southwest coast of the peloponnese here was the very last area of Greece to fall to the Other Nation thing came back into Greece from about 1685 and they took Greece yet again or at least the peloponnese from the Ottoman Empire but the Ottoman Empire then recaptured the whole lot very quickly actually from about 1715 and held it until the Greek war of independence 1821-1832 with coronary I think being one of the first places to be liberated after Kalamata just see if we can see the beach from here um but the whole place is picturesque you can see probably the old castle wall here as with all places just explore come off the Beaten Track and have a look see what we can find I've never been inside before I have been to crony before there's Saga Beach but I want to show you zaga beach before I drive down there which just over here you can see it around the corner there and it is the place if you want to come and someday the best beach down here it's the main reason people come here for the beaches yes coronary has lots of History yes it has a Byzantine Castle but to be honest most places along the coastline in the peloponnese too why the reason you come to Southwest apart from the fact that it's Greek and it is Greek holiday season it's the beach and you can see it there I'm going to drive down there in a few minutes so here we are I've come right down to zanger Beach and it may not look much here because it's very narrow and a bit feminine but you get the other side of the Rocks there and you can see it's beautiful all the way around the castle which is on the end here I hope you can see a plan we've actually come here it's because of this rather decrepit looking ramshackle building here because in the 80s this was a club known as sound and light club and my wife used to come here most nights and dance and sit on these steps she remembers these steps and coming down the beach and apparently she fell off this wall once onto the beach fortunately at the time there wasn't concrete underneath otherwise she probably wouldn't be here today to stand next to me and go up at where she once used to come adults turning into urban explorers we're going to go and see where my wife used to come and dance sorry for itself nowadays but apparently it was the place of the 80s foreign well I hope you've enjoyed our little walk around coroni I'm not sure my video does it justice it's a fantastic place it's beautiful it's breathtaking actually and if you're exploring a peloponnese I'd highly recommend popping in and staying for a night or two I'm now going to go to finacunda mythoni and do another video there so watch out for that and then finally I'll do a video on pilos which is just astonishing so thank you for watching please subscribe and I look forward to seeing you again soon

Channel: Greece Explored 🇬🇷

Views: 11,214

Keywords: Koroni, Koroni Greece, Koroni Peloponnese, Koroni Beach, Zaga Beach, Kalamata Day Trip, Kalamata, Methoni, Finikounta, Finikounda, Pylos, Southern peloponnese, South west peloponnese, Byzantine Castle, Athens, mainland Greece holiday, Greece vacation

Id: oOyYg344Ny4

Length: 14min 21sec (861 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 02 2023