Nymfaio - one of the most beautiful villages of Europe.
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Nymfaio, is considered by travel guides as one of the 10 most beautiful villages in Europe. This increases the expectations of the visitors! At a height of 1350 meters, Nymfaio is located in an alpine landscape that is really breathtaking. We had the fortune to visit it twice, once in late autumn and one more time right in the middle of winter, with snow. All seasons are special and different.
Sights
At first, you park at the mandatory parking just outside the village, unless you turn to the left and follow the regional. The first thing that you’ll see is the arched small bridge, which brings together two of the most impressive mansions of the village. Right after, is the small and graphic stony square. Then, the architectural monument- trademark of Nimfeo, Nikeios School, which was named after the great tobacco merchant Jean Nikou in 1928, whose donation to the village was the magnificent building. Today it works as an information center of "Arktouros", while earlier it was working as a school for many years.
To get to "Arktouros", you only have to wander through the stony backstreets of the village, to admire the unique mansions (don't forget to observe the tin roofs they have for snow protection and, believe me, there’s a lot of snow in winter!), the church of the patron Saint Nicholas with the bells from Konstantinoupoli and Odessa and after you walk for about 10-15 minutes through a stony path, surrounded by beeches, you arrive at the small wooden kiosk, where volunteers guide you in a woods of about sixty acres, in which nine former captive bears live free.
Though, if you visit Arktouros between January and March, you will need to be very quiet, if you are nearby, because the bears come on hibernating, which means that they sleep, very slightly, and the slightest noise can wake them up, that’s why the place is closed.
Food
After all that, you deserve to eat something good, because the walk and the altitude will make you hungry: "Il Faggio" or "Square" in Nimfeo or "Thomas" in the nearby village Sklithro. You can discover the rest by yourself. This is the pleasure of travelling, isn’t it?
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