Thessaloniki

Check out the usual booking sites such as www.booking.com or www.venere.com. We stayed at Colors Central Ladadika, www,colorscentral.gr a modern stylish hotel in a great location. The company have another two hotels in central locations and I would recommend checking them out.

Many new boutique hotels have opened since our first visit six years ago and on our recent visit we stayed at 39 Egnatia, a newly opened very smart hotel in a great location.

Restaurants

You will be spoilt for choice of eating places in Thessaloniki, the city is packed with options to suit all budgets and the quality we found to be of a high standard in all the places we tried. This is a foodie city where Athenian visit to sample the delights of the culinary scene.

Omikron, Oplopiou 3, Ladadika, is just next door to Colors Central and we went on our first evening and had an excellent meal of see bass, sea bream, salad and potatoes with some decent house wine at a very reasonable price.We returned twice on our recent visit and again the quality of food and service was top notch.

Full Tou Meze, Katouni 3, Ladadika, seems to be on the must try list of every list and we went on our last night, it was still very busy even at 10.00pm. The food was really good, the house wine just slightly better than most, and the value for money was exceptional. This visit we went three times the range of meze dishes made choosing four of five to share very hard, the service was good and the managers oversaw things well and incredible value for money.

Ta Tria Gourounakia,  Kapodistria 7, The Three Little Pigs, is just off Ionos Dragoumi, on the edge of Valaoritou night life area. The actual pedestrian area has a number of other options for eating and drinking. The food was very good, and we enjoyed the look and feel of the whole place. It was excellent value for money. We returned and again enjoyed good cooking and service but the lack of house wine does mean this is at the higher end of Thessaloniki eating,

Rouga, Karipi 28, this is No. 1 on a certain web site and we didn’t choose it for that reason but because when we checked out the area it looked inviting, lots of locals, the food looked good and there was good live music. We booked for the next night and were delighted with all the dishes we tried, it was old school Greek food with lovely service.  Just as good as six years ago, we went twice for dinner and as before enjoyed the atmosphere and the food.

Akratos Oinos, Katouni 11, in a street packed with restaurants in Ladadika this stood out as always being very busy, we went three times once for lunch and twice for dinner and loved the food and service, some excellent takes on traditional dishes on the menu. A great find on our recent visit.

Mezen Salonika, Rogkoti 3, close to Ladadika, I found this on the web and was keen to try this very modern place with such great reports. We loved the place and the food, it does have a young vibe but we were well looked after. They specialise in seafood meze served with tsiporou ,like ouzo, from Volos. We started with some of these and then had two other dishes and were very impressed.

Agora Ouzerie, Kapodistria, we found this on a Saturday lunchtime and it was very busy with large groups of locals, the dishes were decent but did not quite hit the delights of other places on this trip.

Modigliani, Kidoniatou 12, Kapani market, we only stopped for a drink while visiting the market but loved the look of the menu and had meant to return unfortunately we didn’t manage another visit but would definitely try next time.

Cafes & Bars

Mojo, Plateia Aristotelous, at any bar café in this famous square you expect to pay slightly more but here this is made up for with complimentary small cakes with coffee, snacks with beers and wines and complimentary bottled water. Great for a break from sightseeing.

Bespoke, Leof Nikis 1, on the waterfront this small bar does coffees, beer cocktails and is a great stopping off place while exploring the city.

Chilai Bar and Restaurant, Ag Mina 4, is a modern fairly new place good to stop for drinks, it is very popular as are most places in this area including Shelter opposite which was good for breakfast or a drink.

Arrogant Bar, Ionos Dragoumi, a good place for a pre dinner wine in a street packed with places to eat.

The Dubliner, Katouni 16, I am not sure that I have ever recommended an Irish bar on and city page but this was a great place to stop for a wine or beer outside or while watching sport, good service and good facilities.

Valoritou is the “alternative” nightlife area, nothing starts till after 9pm except Gambrinus a very popular beer bar.  Later you cannot get down the streets for the crowds outside a variety of types of bars. Do go for a wander and see if any are your style.

Ladadika is another great area for bars and cafes and there is a wide selection of types of places, beer bars, cocktail bars, and cafes. Less frenetic than Valoritou unless you happen to be there for the three day beer festival in June when it is seriously busy.

Drink

Ouzo is of course probably the best known Greek drink and while still seen being drunk with meze it has apparently lost popularity presumably as people change their drinking habits and more cocktail type bars open up.

Also look for Tsiporou, similar to Ouzo but stronger and sometimes given as a complimentary drinks in restaurants and the main drink in some area of the country.

Cocktails are popular both in the cities and on the islands, and many of the island waterfront bars are great for happy hour drinks.

Lager type beer such as Mythos is very commonly drunk but there is increasingly bars focusing on small craft breweries with more ale type beers such as IPA’s.

Lastly wine, and in more informal eating places house wine by the litre is both cheap and drinkable, white, rose and red are usually available. If you are going to try more upmarket wine then it is worth doing some homework before you go to learn about grape types. Greek wines are gaining more and more admirers so check out some of the wine bars that have opened in recent years.

Ano Poli, the upper town is definitely worth a visit, take the Blue tourist bus up and walk down, or it can be reached by local bus. There are many sites to see, the castle, walls and also the original old houses.

The central area has three sites well worth a visit all connected to the 4^th century emperor Galerius, there is the rotunda, the arch and the remains of his palace.

Thessalonoki also has a number of very good galleries and museums including two at the port focusing on cinema and photography.