Archontiko Zachlorou

The area was really quiet and interesting, and the rooms were great, though they could use tables and a clothes set. The service was very poor. During the five days we stayed, nobody checked the rooms, and they didn’t seem to care about anything. The strangest part was that they wouldn’t accept card payment. They insisted we cancel the booking through Booking and pay in cash. I hope they fix these small things.

At €110 a night in a mountain village, I expected a decent view, but ours was mostly a rubbish-strewn backyard, with part of it blocked by an unfinished wall. Parking also felt like a free-for-all: spaces weren’t clearly assigned to the apartments, and there seemed to be fewer than the number of suites. There was no Wi-Fi at all. The suite looked nicely put together and the bedding was very good, though the bathtub beside the bed isn’t my thing. The room was missing basic items like a chair, table, and bin. It was freezing and clearly poorly insulated. We’d told them in advance we were bringing a three-month-old, but nothing had been done; it took about an hour and a half for the room to become bearable. The cleanliness was a real letdown. The suite seemed recently built, but it didn’t look as if it had ever been properly cleaned. And when the guests upstairs used their in-room bathtub, the noise made ours a terrible experience.

After hiking from Niamata to Zachlorou along the odontos railway, we found the room comfortable and reasonably priced, with a lovely mountain view. It was clean, had a shower and a corner spa bath, and there was a fireplace we could use. Breakfast was generous. It seemed to be the off season, so the Taverna was shut for dinner and there wasn’t a local shop open. There was just one caretaker or concierge around. He spoke a little German and less English, and could only accept cash.

There was no soundproofing, so we could hear everything from the rooms beside us and above. Worse, smoke from the next room’s fireplace filled ours and kept us awake all night. We had to leave the window open on April 1, and even that didn’t clear the smell.