Spending the winter in Greece in a motorhome

We have spent four months in Greece, arriving in the north from Bulgaria in the first week of November and leaving from the port of Igoumenitsa on the west coast in early March. It has been everything we hoped for, offering fabulous scenery, a variety of free overnight parking places, friendly people, beautiful weather and astonishing heritage. We have loved every minute, and wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to likeminded motorhomers. 

Here are our top ten memories from our winter in Greece:

• Relaxed, welcoming, friendly and approachable people
• More blue skies than we had any right to expect
• Incredible archaeology, from the crowning glory of the Parthenon to bronze age graves lying open on the beach
• Snow capped mountain peaks, sheer cliffs, and sandy beaches by turquoise seas
• Fresh, simple food cooked to order
• Monasteries clinging to vertical rock faces and perched on impossible peaks
• Greek yoghurt with black honey from mountain bees
• Pretty harbours with bobbing fishing boats beside sleek pleasure yachts
• Fresh orange juice for breakfast from fruit bought cheap at the roadside 
• Sun-kissed mountain villages with paved streets and narrow alleyways

We've pulled together this guide to winter motor homing in Greece from our experience. We hope you find it useful.

Weather

Let's face it, the reason for spending the winter in southern Europe is in the hope of better weather than in the north. Even four-seasons motorhomers struggle when it rains for days on end. We can't promise that every winter will be as dry and warm as 2019/20, but this was our experience:

• A handful of washout days, mainly in the north, barely any in the Peloponnese
• Half a dozen spectacular thunderstorms, sometimes with high winds
• Average daytime temperatures of 14-18º C
• Average nighttime temperatures of 4-6º C
• Spending most days in a light jumper or t-shirt
• Only needing a jacket at night, or on a dozen or so cooler days
• Being able to sit outside comfortably in 12-14ºC, because the sun is so strong
• Swimming on Christmas Day
• Blue skies and sunshine for some part of most days

We had two weeks in Halkidiki, northern Greece, in November, in which the weather was 18-22ºC most days, but we were told this was unusually warm. We also had four weeks of almost unbroken dry weather in December and January in the Peloponnese. The weather  was noticeably wetter and cloudier as we came north along the west coast in late February. Water temperatures were 16/17º C in November, but nearer 13ºC in March.

Blue skies...

In short, it was perfect weather for being active and outdoors, but not really sunbathing weather. Being from the north of England we were also wearing at least two layers less than the locals, who were invariably in their big coats.

...and wet days too

Getting there

Overland
We chose to take the longer route south through Romania and Bulgaria, avoiding most of the former Yugoslavia, for three reasons. 

• Our insurance only covers us for the EU and a few other named countries, and we would have had to buy extra cover 
• We do not have titration test results to prove the dogs have rabies immunity, required to cross some non-EU borders 
• Romania and Bulgaria are beautiful, fascinating countries to visit, Transylvania was one of the highlights of our trip, and we would have no hesitation in recommending that route to Greece.

By ferry
We decided to leave Greece via the Grimaldi Lines ferry from Igoumenitsa to Brindisi, one of the shortest crossings. It was still winter, so camping on deck was not possible (only allowed from April) so we booked a pet cabin for the four of us. The cabin was large and fairly comfortable, if basic. Organisation for tourist passengers left a lot to be desired, and it's largely up to you to find the ship and where to board it. These ferries are the truckstops of the ferry world and mostly consist of vehicle decks full of trucks. Passengers board on the vehicle ramp and drivers need to exit the van quickly or risk being blocked in.

On the road

Driving
We found Greek drivers to be, on the whole, good natured and tolerant. They make it their business to get past you, and if they make a few death defying manoeuvres to do so, then that's their business. Pulling over to make it easier is appreciated, and you'll often see lorries driving on the hard shoulder so others can pass. 
We rarely felt that anyone questioned our presence in their small mountain/fishing village. Lorries, buses and tractors are probably using the same roads - in fact one of the few occasions we had to reverse was when the truck in front and the scheduled bus service all had to make way for a truck and trailer at a pinch point. 
If you take it slowly, watch for high level balconies and branches, and are prepared to reverse, then you should be able to drive most places that you want to go. Impossibly tight places are usually clearly marked to exclude lorries, caravans or vehicles over 3.5t. Larger vehicles may want to stick to trunk roads for most of the journey.
You may find stress levels higher in cities and in the summer season. 
  
Roads

Best not drive here

The roads themselves are generally good quality, with the infrequent frosts making the surfaces better than many we have seen elsewhere. They tend to be worse through villages, where regional road maintenance clearly doesn't extend. Dirtroads through olive groves may appear on maps as part of the road network, and will often be very rough and narrow.  
If you are driving around the Peloponnese peninsulas, or on a mountain pass, then you will need to negotiate hairpins, but those we encountered were generally wide and not too steep. The edges of the roads were usually in acceptable condition, with cones, rocks or barriers placed where crumbling was likely to be a hazard. We didn't attempt the Langada pass (1500m) but we did drive the Kosmas pass (1168m) and found it straightforward, if a little dizzying. There were sections with no barriers, including some of the hairpins. 
For almost all of our trip the roads were quiet - we encountered only six vehicles on the Kosmas pass - and that made driving much easier than it might have been. By contrast we went to the pretty mountain village of Arachova on a Sunday near Christmas and found the roads lined with cars and the streets thronging with people. Fortunately the spacious lookout point about a mile away easily accommodated Florence.

Signs and road markings
These were usually familiar, and not too hard to follow, although both signs and white Iines are often badly faded. If a destination sign is in Greek characters it will usually be repeated in Roman ones.
Speed limits are a maximum of 50kph through villages and 80 or 90 elsewhere. The limit starts with the village sign if there is no speed limit sign. Some areas have 30kph limits, especially near schools. Speed cameras are signed and not uncommon.
Stop signs are frequent where we would expect a Give Way - on roundabouts, when merging with a main road and even at traffic lights. This appears to be the only way to get the attention of Greek drivers, but we've observed that a "rolling stop" is common. It may also be to reinforce roundabout rules in a country that has had priority to right in the past, and there are still a few roundabouts where the priority remains with the major road, so it's important to look for Stop signs.
Double white lines are common and may prevent you from making a left turn towards your destination. Google Maps was aware of many, but not all of the banned left turns. The alternative will usually involve a detour.
Traffic lights go directly from red to green. They are preceded by flashing amber lights to warn you of an approaching red.

Fuel
There are fuel stations everywhere, and if there is one, there will usually be several. We used a variety of different brands without problem, preferring those on the outskirts of towns where there is more room for a motorhome to manoeuvre. Some fuel stations in smaller towns close on Sundays. All the fuel stations we used had serviced pumps. All took cards - except for a small one outside Nafplio being looked after for the afternoon by granny, who was adamant her eyes weren't good enough to use the machine!

Tolls
Tolls only apply on motorways, but they can quickly become expensive. The higher rate applies to any vehicle over 2.7m high, which meant that where a car might pay, for example, €1.80, we would be charged between 4 and 5 euros for as little as 15km. Generally we avoided toll roads, but there were occasions around Thessalonika and Athens where it was easier to use the motorway. 
You can use ViaMichelin to calculate tolls.
In some places where a motorway has replaced an old national road, the old road may now ban traffic over 3.5t (eg the 8 between Corinth and Patras) and all maintenance will almost certainly have ceased, making these some of the worst roads to drive, albeit the most picturesque. 

Parking 
Parking gets a special mention in Greece because it appears part of the culture to park anywhere the vehicle will fit. Parking on corners, in narrow streets, and double parking are all common, although double parked vehicles usually have their hazards on. However, in most cases people do seem to have a psychic ability to know how much space to leave, and we never failed to find a way through, even if there was sometimes only a couple of inches either side. 
We didn't actually see anyone with a parking ticket, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. It does mean that, out of season, you are unlikely to be bothered if you park somewhere sensible like the side of a road or an area of rough ground that looks vaguely like a car park. 

Food and drink

Supermarkets
There are several big chains of supermarkets. We tended to favour Lidl as the brands were familiar and almost everything is labelled in English as well as Greek. We became fond of Sklabenitis, which is more upmarket and has an excellent range. AB and Masoutis were good middle market options.

Convenience stores are in most small towns and villages, often still signed as supermarkets. Many carry an excellent range. Don't expect fresh bread if there is a bakery in town - you'll have to buy that separately. 

Local produce

Wonderful black honey

We enjoyed Kalamata olives, and olive oil; greek yoghurt; honey, and fresh orange juice. Oranges are €3-4 a bag at roadside stalls - don't forget to bring a hand juicer.

Eating out
Eating out in the closed season isn't always easy, as most of the tavernas in tourist areas close over winter. In non-tourist areas food is not always served at lunchtime, when Greeks seem to exist on coffee, and perhaps a pastry. When food is served in the day it's more likely to be burgers and pizza than traditional fare. Souvlaki and Gyros are also easy to find.
That said, we had several lovely meals, usually by just checking ahead that they would be open. A couple of times we were the only customers, and the menu was short and reeled off by the proprietor, but none the worse for that. 
Out of season dishes that require long preparation times may not be available. Be prepared to be flexible. Traditional tavernas usually provide a free starter and desert, often fruit. 
We had a couple of nice meals by asking for a few starters as a meze when a menu was offered. Nibbles are usually given free with drinks.
Fish is expensive in Greece, but it's caught in a traditionally labour intensive way, and was still swimming earlier that day. If you are worried, check the price first.
We ate out about once a week, spending an average of €30 for two, with wine.
See Taverna car parks below for more info on using them as Motorhome stopovers.

Alcohol
To anyone who thinks Greek wine starts and ends with Retsina, well, think again. The quality of Greek wine has come on in leaps and bounds....just as well as you will struggle to find imported wines in Greek supermarkets and, when you do, they will be eye-wateringly expensive. 

If you are eating out just ask for a carafe of the house red or white and you will not be disappointed. When shopping we bought most of our wine in Lidl where it is possible to get perfectly acceptable reds and dry whites for less than €4. Nemea red was consistently reliable. If you want to push the boat out Santorini is seen as the peak of Greek wines but be prepared to pay €15-20 a bottle. Mavrodafni is a rather nice sweet red wine, like a light port. 

Greece makes a lot of lager which isn't normally to our taste. The brands we most liked were Fix and Vergina. Lidl beer range is pretty poor but you will find German and Belgian beer in many other supermarkets. Lidl was useful for gin €9 a bottle, and also sold Tuborg tonic. Imported spirits are expensive.

Motorhome servicing

Fresh water

A roadside fountain

Water is seen a public good in Greece, and there are numerous fountains by the side of the road, standpipes in marinas, and beach showers with taps in resorts. Many of these are no longer in use, or are turned off in winter, but their recent status is usually clearly marked on Park4Night, and we rarely struggled to fill the tank. On one occasion roads to the fountain were too narrow to risk, and we had no problem filling at a local garage, but we rarely had cause to ask.
Many of the fountains and beach showers have screw fittings for hose connectors, but by no means all. We carry two collapsible 10l water carriers, and we used them to fill the tank via the internal cap on half a dozen occasions in Greece. (They were a lifesaver in Bulgaria.)
We drink the water in our tank. We know some people choose not to, but the water from mountain springs and rural fountains is usually lovely. City water is more heavily chlorinated.

Grey water
There are virtually no official places to dump grey water, certainly not drive-over ones. We stopped regularly on waste ground and let it run into the gravel. We were careful not to let it run onto a road, drop it on a tarmac parking area or leave puddles. Even in the campsites we stayed on we had to empty with a bucket, and it's worth having a collapsible bowl and bucket to collect grey water so it can be emptied into grass or bushes.

Black water
This is the most challenging aspect of motorhoming in Greece over winter if you do not use campsites. We found only one official motorhome cassette emptying point in Greece. (At a services east of Thessalonika.)
Public toilets are usually locked out of season, although the tourist information officer in Edessa was keen to tell us we could not only park next to his office but use the nearby open public toilets to (mimes chucking). Others we met were told the same by the attendant at a motorway services. Most people in Greece are not precious about bodily fluids, and where public toilets are open few would think it strange to put down them what usually goes down them. Think grannies and chamber pots. 
Do remember that you should not usually put toilet paper down Greek toilets, there will be a bin provided.
Where we failed to find public toilets or portaloos, and we were between campsites, it was not hard to find remote places to take a shovel. We do not use chemicals. 
As you can see, a spare cassette is a must.

Rubbish
Large communal rubbish bins are everywhere in Greece, usually accompanied by blue recycling bins. We didn't find it difficult to dispose of waste and recycling. Few bins were quite as hi-tech as the talking underground bins we encountered in Areopoli, but then they don't need to be. 

Talking bins

LPG
We use a Gaslow cylinder for cooking, heating water and for the fridge when not on hook-up, which is most of the time. We refill using an Autogas filler point in the skirt of the van. We were refused a fill-up twice, and told that suppliers are not allowed to provide autogas for cooking in Greece. We successfully filled up ten other times. 
We deduced from this that most places either assume we are using it for engine fuel, or operate a don't ask/don't tell policy. To assist with this we never opened the gas locker, keeping the adaptor separately, and we never filled up with diesel at the same service station. 
Autogas was widely available and well signed, with at least one fuel station stocking it in each town, generally on the outskirts.
Park4night also has details of suppliers which will refill other gas canisters, but we never had to use them.

Motorhome Stopovers

Wild camping
Wild, or free camping is illegal in Greece and subject to a €300 fine. It seems clear to us that the definition of camping is well understood by the local police, and parking a motorhome legally and sleeping in it is not a problem, especially out of season, as long as you do not indulge in camping behaviour. The rules for this are much the same as in Spain: no unpacking tables and chairs, no hanging washing outside the van, no dropping fluids. 
We found some truly fabulous wild camping spots, and only one or two we wouldn't use again, all with the help and guidance of park4night. 
The places we found fell into three main categories: marinas and harbours, quiet roads beside the beach or parking areas off them, and mountain lay-bys. 
Marinas and harbours are the most dependable option, used as they are to having visiting yachts, and generally providing plenty of space for parking and accessible water points. 
We spent a lot of time parked alongside beaches where we could usually walk our spaniels, find water from beach showers, and enjoy a nice view. The best of these were off the beaten track, and dead-end roads are worth seeking out.

A quiet cove

Mountain lay-bys can be limiting if you need to walk dogs, but offer great views and can be invaluable when travelling.
You'll notice that No Camping signs tend to have pictograms of tents and caravans, and it's these that they are primarily intended to discourage. Self-contained motorhomes staying a single night are usually overlooked out of season. Officially you aren't allowed to spend the night at an archaeological site, but we used their car parks several times without comment from staff.
Three places where we stayed were visited by police. Once they asked a French van which had been parked for several days if they would move on the next day. The second time it was to enlist our help to find a missing person who'd been seen travelling with someone in a motorhome. The third time it was to point out that the area where seven motorhomes had now gathered by the beach in Kalamata wasn't actually part of the car park and could we move. Many other times police drove by, looked us over and moved on.
The message is clear: don't unpack, leave the area clean and tidy, don't outstay your welcome and don't assemble in large numbers. 
I'd add one other: be nice to people fishing. At most harbours and beaches people will turn up to go night fishing. You are on their turf. If you say hello and don't get in their way they will just work around you. And they are the best security system you could have. 

Wild camping as it should be

Campsites
Most campsites in Greece close over winter, but not all. In the Peloponnese there are at least ten open through the year, and they can be a great place to spend some downtime, or to come off the road for weeks at a time. We spent two weeks over Christmas at Camping Finikes (€14 a night) and loved it. We also spent time at Camping Mani Beach (€18), and Camping Argolic Strand (€18). There is also an all-year campsite at Meteora (€15), and a great Camperstop at Ancient Corinth (€13).
Bear in mind: the campsite will be almost empty, and bars, pools and shops won't be open; there will be a few people there spending the whole winter, often in caravans; other campsite facilities are pretty basic. 
For all that, it's somewhere to indulge in all that camping behaviour - take out the chairs and tables, set up the barbecue, hang out the washing. 

Taverna car parks
The Greek equivalent of Britstops, these are growing in popularity, and can be a great option if you accept that eating in the taverna is expected, if not obligatory. We had a great experience near Areopoli, with a friendly host and a good value meal. However, many of these will be closed out of season, and are primarily to offer people an option on the road in the summer.

Laundry

Some laundrettes cater for pups

In the North of Greece, particularly in the large cities like Athens and Thessalonika, self service laundrettes are common and good value. They often have free Wifi so you can browse the internet while your clothes go round and round. We found these much less common in the Peloponnese. The alternatives were to spend a couple of nights on a site to allow for laundry and a bit of cleaning of the van. Park4Nights usually indicates whether a particular site has a washing machine although there may only be one. Dryers on sites are rare, hardly surprising given the climate, so do your wash when you know you can hang up the damp clothes.

One other alternative in some towns are service washes, often attached to a dry cleaners. They will normally return your clothes dried and folded the same day or, at worst, within 24 hours. Expect to pay more here than in laundrettes. We paid €20 for two 7 kilo loads in Sparta.

Things to do

An interest in history is invaluable when visiting Greece, and we went to most of the major UNESCO world heritage sites on the mainland. In winter everyone pays the reduced rate, usually €3-6, which will also allow you entrance to the associated museum. The first Sunday of the month is free. Many small local sites are also free, and can be fun just to wander around.
We didn't visit many monasteries, some aren't very motorhome friendly to access, but we could have seen dozens. An interest in frescoes would be an advantage.
Hiking and climbing are growing in popularity in Greece's off-season. Mount Olympus and the Mani peninsula are great for hiking, Leonidio is a climbers' Mecca.

Language and communication

As long as you can say Kalimera and Efkaristo to everyone, you will get by okay with language. While not all Greeks speak English, those working in tourist areas, at campsites and attractions will know enough. The two garages and camping shops we visited also spoke good English. It's sensible to practise recognising Greek characters in order to decipher food labels, place names and signs, but not essential. A smattering of German will help when conversing with fellow travellers.

Fortified hill towns

Dogs

Dogs are everywhere in Greece. They bark from every garden and olive grove, follow you down every street, and accompany you on walks. Pet dogs are walked on city streets, and pet shops are abundant. But the stray problem is persistent and widespread. 
Travelling with our two spaniels was largely trouble free. They couldn't accompany us into Athens on the metro, or on the rack railway to Kalavryta, but were not banned from beaches (out of season) and sat outside with us at any number of cafés and tavernas. They were threatened three times by packs of town strays, but each time locals came to drive the strays away, or we were able to make them back off. We took to carrying a stick. Most strays are fearful and submissive, and will quickly slink away. Some will adopt you at the slightest friendly gesture and appoint themselves your guardians until you leave, including accompanying you on runs or walks.
Walking past guard dogs is more upsetting for our two, who don't like being barked at, but these dogs are usually chained or behind fences. It can however make village walks a bit stressful.
Pine processionary caterpillars were leaving their nests while we were in Greece, from mid-February. Encounters with these can be fatal for dogs, and we were very careful to keep an eye out for them underneath pine trees.

Costs

We calculate costs in pounds as we have used a variety of currencies.
Our average daily spend in Greece over the four months would have been £38. Unfortunately two new leisure batteries, new brake pads, a windscreen excess and the ferry to Brindisi added almost £1500, so the actual average is £50. It still managed to reduce the average daily spend over the whole trip by about £3, so we think it's been pretty good value.

Precipitous monasteries

Any other questions?

If you want to know more, you can follow our journey using the map link here which also links to our blogs. Feel free to leave a question or comment at the bottom of the page.