In this video I go from Thessaloniki to the central Pindos mountains to see what roads this Greek mountain range has to offer. Does the Tzoumerka National Park make a good base for mountain and mountain pass road trip in Greece?
Some Words About Greece
I think many people have the idea of Greece as being a summer destination of beautiful small islands, crystal clear sea and sandy beaches. But the geographic reality is a bit different. While Greece has one of the longest coastlines of any country in the world, 80% of it’s land is classed as mountainous and lots of mountains is usually a recipe for great driving roads. In this video I leave Thessaloniki for the central Pindos mountains to find out if the Tzoumerka National Park makes a good destination for a Greek driving holiday.
They questions I want to answer are:
What type of roads does it have?
What are the road surfaces like?
What is the scenery like?
When is the best time to go?
Can I recommend it for a driving holiday?
But before we get into the in and outs, lets cover the basics.
The area is extremely isolated. If you are not staying in a hotel, take food with you, there is a good chance a supermarket with the things you usually buy will be back in Ioannina or Arta.
When To Go?
Weather
We went in August and even though we were staying at 800 meters it was still 36C during the day. Night temps dropped to around 24C.
Traffic
The area was super quiet, very few tourists on the East and the West sides of the mountain range.
However the north and the south ends had some tourists but nothing major. I imagine in the spring and autumn is when it gets busy, temperatures are a bit cooler, more water in the rives, more water coming from the waterfalls.
Perhaps it’s also busy in winter also but I think it may be a bit touch-and-go for the mountain passes because of snow.
Because of the traffic at the busy times and because some of the roads are flat out scary, I think I would avoid the busy times (spring/autumn). And unless you have a 4×4, I think winter would be out unless the weather was mild. Plus rocks falls are a real problem there even in August, going in a rainy season could be excessively dodgy.
In short, I think the summer was perfect for what we wanted to do there ie drive mountain roads.
Meat & Potatoes – The Stand-Out Roads
Dangreousroads put me on to the first major pass, the Baros Pass.
Baros Pass.
Baros is probably the most famous pass in Tzoumerka and it’s one of the highest mountain passes in Greece at 1903m. It links the east and west sides of the mountain range at the north end. To give an idea of how isolated this area is, the Baros is now one of the busiest roads in Tzoumerka but it was a dirt road only accessible by 4×4 until 2014(!).
Baros Pass – Technical Specs
There are three roads which meet at the summit of the pass. One from Chaliki village on the East side. The other two roads come from the west side, one road comes up from Kalarites the other from Matsouki.
Route A – Kalarites
The Kalarites road is by far the more touristy because of two main sites. The famous monastary, and a water mill/waterfall. We didn’t stop at these places but when we passed there were 10-20 cars parked at each place. Considering we were seeing a car every ten minutes on the road to get there, this was a massive amount of traffic. This are might be congested during busy periods.
The road up to Kalarites is narrow, it’s steep, with big drop offs, not the greatest surface with people coming at you around hairpins in the middle of the road. You get the idea. It’s exciting.
After the village you get up out of the trees and you’re into an Alpine environment, it’s an asphalt road for the most part but there are a couple of narrow sections and sections which turn to dirt with overhanging rocks but generally its asphalt to the top. It’s definitely an interesting drive with excellent views.
Route B – Matsouki
The road up to Matsouki seems Less touristy and arguably a bit less hair-raising but the scenery is up there with the Kalarites route. Having said that, the road up through the village to get to Baros pass proper is challenging. One lane streets, blind and very steep. Side note – This footpath here looks worth a walk.
Past the village it’s similar to the road up from Kalarites but without the overhanging rocks. I’d say the road is a bit worse surface wise but the scenery may be even more spectacular than the Kalarites route.
At the top of the pass you can do a loop and come back down to Kalarites and vice versa.
Antousa/Chaliki
If you want to cross over to the mountain range, the road down the other side is more of a traditional “alpine” pass. Switchbacks, pine trees, steep and with occasional sections where the asphalt has been washed away but still passable in a car (when we were there). Road surface wise this side has better quality tarmac and perhaps the scenery is not as amazing as the other side but still worth seeing.
If you do decide to go down the other side you’ll either have to come back up the same way if you are staying on the west side of the Tzoumerka mountains or take a big loop over the Skafida Pass (honestly, not that great compared to the Baros, I’d give it a miss) up to Metsovo and back round, or drivea lap around the entire Tzoumerka mountain range.
Lap of Tzoumerka
It is possible to drive a circle around Tzoumerka (click the link for route details) with car, at least when we went. It’s asphalt for most of the way except the part between Alexiou bridge and Armatoliko (see the link for route details), this is a long stretch of road on gravel washboard road. It’s not a great road by any stretch and it’s not ideally suited a car but we made it (average speed on this section was about 20 km/h).
Paleochori Mistake (probably)
About halfway down to Armatoliko I think we made the mistake of going up to Paleochori. We did this because the road up to Paleochori had asphalt, but it turned into a bad gravel road after a couple of kilometers (we averaged 10km/h at most). I think it would have been better to continue on the road next to the river.
Mesochora Dam
From Armatoliko the road took us down to the Mesochora dam. A simply massive dam that has never been filled due to legal battles. It’s the first time I’ve seen an unfilled dam. This on it’s own was worth the trip. A very impressive man-made structure. From here we went down to the main Arta-Trikala road to get back up to Kataraktis where we were staying. We did take a little detour to try and get up to Theodoriana pass and village but that did not go as planned, I’ll go into detail below.
Would we do the lap of Tzoumerka again?
I think yes. It was definitely an experience. Even more isolated than the west side of the range and the road followed the river where we could see the results of what looked like a recent massive flood. It felt dodgy/stupid at points doing the gravel section in a car but where is the fun in safety!
Also the weather was subtly different on the east side of the mountain range, it seemed to rain here every evening whereas is was almost completely dry on the west side. On the whole it was something quite different to the west side of the mountains.
Theodoriana Pass – The pass we attempted during the “lap”
The other big (paved) pass over Tzourmerka was between Athamanio and Theodoriana. From Athamanio it’s steep, paved switchbacks. But after you leave any signs of houses the road turned into a mixture of gravel and broken tarmac to the summit. Just about passable in a car. Views not as amazing as we thought they would be but still spectacular. Going down the other-side to Theodoriana the road surface was better. Passing through Theodoriana village was okay but again, narrow and steep streets which are blind.
The road out of Theodoriana is where the excitement is/was. About a quarter of the way down there had been a landslide. Instead of removing all the dirt, they just made a new road on top of the landslide. Gravel surface, no barriers and signs saying “you use this road at your own risk”. There are also signs at either end of the road saying the road is closed.
The road from the landslide down to the main road at the bottom, goes along a cliff face for about a kilometer, you’ve got sheer/overhanging rocks above you and a sheer drop down to the left. Like something you’d see in Columbia or the Himalayas. Very impressive and exciting.
We tried to do the pass the previous day in the opposite direction during our “lap of Tzoumerka” but it was raining and when we got up to the section of “road” over the avalanche/landslide debris I turned back immediately, it looked absolutely bonkers. Like something you drive in a nightmare and die during the attempt.
Generally, the photos and the videos don’t give the sense of scale (and danger!) at all.
Other Road Trips/Roads Worth Checking
Kataraktis Waterfalls
The road up to the Katarraktis waterfalls is a single lane switch back road with bad (asphalted) road surface but excellent views. Waterfalls were dry when we were there but I expect they are spectacular when they are running.
Road from Ioannina
We tripped on this one accidentally, this is the road Google Maps took us on as the quickest way to get to Kataraktis from Thessaloniki. It’s the road that takes you down into the main valley of Tzoumerka. It’s a two lane road which looks normal until you reach the highest point and start dropping down into the valley. The section going down has amazing views of the valley with a simply massive cliff drop to your left. I think this was by far the busiest road we went on in the valley and a good introduction to the types of road in the area.
West Side of Valley
This road was okay, good views but not the best road surface in general. Generally we preferred the east side of the valley.
Roads We Missed
This road looks decent. Not buried in the woods and with good views.
The mountain refuge looks amazing and it is asphalted for some of the way, unfortunately our car was too low and we couldn’t reach the asphalt section. I think in a normal car it’s achievable.
Mountain tracks. The area is full of tracks high in the mountains that have not been asphalted but look relatively decent ie they were made to actually transport people. I’m not ruling out the possibility of coming back to the area with a SUV!
What’s The Verdict
If you’re looking for road trip in Greece where you can test the cornering limits of your car, this is not the place. The road surfaces are too bumpy, there are too many rocks and stones falling into the road and the roads are generally too narrow.
Having said all that, the roads are entertaining because you’re constantly reading the road surface for subsidence, rocks and animals, and off the main roads, the single track roads that criss-cross the valley can be extremely steep, with blind corners and very tight switchbacks.
I did get a big thrill of driving there so I definitely recommend it to anyone that likes driving, on and off road.
What Car To Take?
Your average hire car with decent ground clearance and suspension travel would be perfect. I think a Fiat Panda or something like a Nissan Qashqai would be ideal. We went there with a lowered car and we managed, it may have even elevated the excitement factor but I think a normal car would be more sensible, give less tress and give more options on the roads that can be driven.
Things to Note
I’ve mentioned rocks and stone falling into the road. This looks like a constant year round problem judging by the amount of diggers and earth moving equipment parked around the roads of the area.
I’ve mentioned the tightness of the roads which might be a bit of a nightmare as busy tourist times.
One thing I haven’t covered is the road surfaces. Not that they are bad and can alternate between asphalt and gravel which they do. I mean the fact that they lured us into a false sense of security on many occasions. A road might start off with decent asphalt (it might even be wide) and then without warning turning into pure gravel/dirt for kilometers. If the car has decent ground clearance no problem, if it’s bit marginal like the car we had, our pace had to drop a lot. But this is all part of the adventure in Tzoumerka!
And one last thing, the weather. It’s Greece so the weather is amazing most of the time but if it’s going to rain I think it’s important to understand how that is going to affect the road. If the road gets wet, does it look like it might turn into mud, generally important but especially so if the road is also steep.