Maria Studios

We've just come back from a week in the Maria appartments, and while the beach-front location is an attraction I must say it had its drawbacks as well.  Maria is only accesible from a track leading down to the beach, which is unlit, stony and full of thorns - be careful at night!  Also the ricketly boardwalk which runs along the beachfront in Ag Gordios (the only way across the beach, no path!) ends before you get to the Maria track, so don't bother with shoes for the holiday, you will always be walking on the sand! The back access to the appartment is down very steep, dark metal steps - nightmare to carry your cases down. Also beware of the mosquitoes, as the Maria is set in gardens - Corfu is particularly bad for mozzies anyway because of the lush climate, and this holiday I got bitten to death, the first time in 6 visits to Greece.  Bring at least 3 mozzy plugs and the strongest spray you can find - and then buy the local bite lotion after you get bitten anyway!  On the plus side (!) the Maria was very clean and well equipped - even had a kettle.  Maria the owner visits to water the garden and cleans once a week, but you will need your own towels, as there's only handtowels.  Also if you have a late flight there is nowhere else for you to go after you get kicked out at 10am (this really spoilt our trip has we had to find somewhere to hang round until 2.30am).

Aghios Gordios itself was pleasant enough but I have to say not a place you would be inspired by - it lacked any real charm as it had no waterfront or village centre, just one street of tacky gift shops, supermarkets and bars/restaurants. Also it was also just too quiet for my liking - I knew it was meant to be a quiet place aimed at families and older people but because of the suprisingly large number of bars and restaurants in the resort I had expected there to be at least some sign of life in the evenings, somewhere to relax with a bottle of wine after your meal. However after 10.30pm it was a ghost town, full of empty bars open til midnight (how these places manage to survive I don't know). Thank God we found Stevens on the Hill towards the end of the week, a very friendly place with a nice welcoming atmosphere - we were so glad to find a bit of company for the evenings! There are very scenic views of the sea from up the many steep hills and the beach was long and sandy, quite good by Greek standards - very quiet up our end away from the sunbeds, but like all Greek beaches you did need to wear shoes in the water to avoid the stones and rocks.

The food in the restaurants was definitely the best thing about Ag Gordios - we had excellent food in Linda's (best moussaka you will ever taste!) and the Mad Greek (amazing kleftiko), and also Sebastian's, Stevens on the Hill and Zefyros were all very good.  The Lemon Tree and Dionyssis had live music some nights and hence a bit of atmosphere, and there were many other places to choose as well.  I would recommend getting out to see a bit of the island as Ag Gordios is so quiet - a trip to Corfu town was well worth it, a very interesting and historical place, and also the Achilleon palace was good.  I think the best  places in Corfu were Kassopi and Palaeokastrista, both very stunning.