Léfkes - Panagía Thapsánoon - Parikiá

Evaluation: This is the possible continuation of the classical hike on Páros, from Pródromos to Léfkes, the so-called "Byzantine path" – in case you cannot return from Léfkes by bus. The part over the valley of Korakiá goes mainly along not very pleasant gravel roads, but from Panagía Thapsánoon there is quite a nice trail back to Parikiá. This hike gets an evaluation of *.

Estimated time: The actual hiking time to Panagía Thapsánoon is 1h40; you then have to count on another 1h20 till Parikiá. We walked five hours (TWT).

Route description: From the bus station in Léfkes and coming from the tiled road that runs above Léfkes (see the hike Pródromos - Léfkes) you take the road on the left. After some 3 minutes you arrive at a junction where you go left, in the direction of Agi Pántes. About 5 minutes later you get to another road coming from the centre of Léfkes, but at this point you go straight ahead. For the next 15 minutes you walk on a concrete road going up gradually – this road is not too unpleasant though, because there are many trees. 

After 10 minutes, in a bend to the right, you find an earth road on the right-hand side: you go right here, in between some pine trees and alongside a newly built house and a wall. Next to a couple of pine trees you go down and after about 8 minutes you arrive at a road, which you follow towards the left. You will now describe a long loop around the valley on your right-hand side. Some 10 minutes later you take a small road going down, to cross the valley and the bed of the river; you then return on the opposite side of the river.

Your trail continues fairly easily along the earth road; after about 8 minutes you keep to the left, but some 10 metres further on you have to watch out: it seems as if the earth road splits up and you take a left against a tall wall. For the next 10 minutes you climb up steeply, until you reach an elevation. You then continue for another 5 minutes until you get to the right-hand side of a farm.

At this point you take the road off the left; you go up for a little while over some asphalt, but the path then becomes a gravel road again. This gravel road goes towards the west, for quite some time in the direction of the large building in front of you – later on this large building will turn out to be the monastery of Panagía Thapsánoon. Five minutes further down you go left and a little later on you take a left again – you do not go in the direction of a farm. You have to go over a couple of iron gates and after a long detour to the left you get to a building, after having walked on steadily for about 25 minutes. You then walk around this building towards the right.

You follow the gravel road for another 15 minutes while you approach the impressive building of Panagía Thapsánoon. You DO NOT take the road that goes to the left in front of the monastery (this road runs to a dead end after quite a while!). Instead you walk past the monastery – the modern monastery was only built in 1935, on the remnants of a 17^th century monastery. It is a nunnery and it can only be visited by women.

Some 50 metres past the monastery you get to a concrete path that goes down to the left. After 5 metres you have to open an iron gate and then the trail turns into a gravel path again. Another 10 minutes later on you get above the chapel of Agios Dimítris. You descend to the chapel and then to the bed of a small river. On the other side of the river you follow the trail to the right.

We still have to explore the rest of this hike, but this trail should bring you to Parikiá in about 1h20...