Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Akronafplía fort
Always open • Free
he
Akronafplía fort
, to the west of the Palamídhi, occupies the ancient acropolis,
whose walls were adapted by three successive medieval restorers - hence the name. The
fortifications are today far less complete than those of the Palamídhi, and the most
intact section, the lower Torrione castle, was adapted to house hotels.
Arvanitiá beach
A fork in the access road to Akronafplía brings you down to a small beach,
Arvanitiá
,
an
enjoyable enough spot to cool of in the shelter of the forts. It gets very crowded in peak
season and is more pleasant in the early evening with only a few swimmers. Continue
along the path from just past the beach entrance for a few minutes, and you can take
steps down to some small stone platforms by the sea, or take the attractive paved path
around the western end of Akronafplía, to the main town harbour. A dirt road to the
southeast of Arvanitiá leads to Karathónas beach (see opposite), a 45-minute walk.
2
Boúrtzi fort
Daily: 8am-sunset • Return boat trip €3, from the northeastern end of Ákti Miaoúli
The town's third fort, the much-photographed
Boúrtzi
, occupies Ayíou Theodhórou
islet offshore from the harbour. Built in 1473 by the Venetians to control the shipping
lane to the town and to much of Árgos bay, the castle has seen various uses in modern
times - from the nineteenth-century home of the town's public executioner to a
luxury hotel in the early twentieth century. In her autobiography
I Was Born Greek
,
the actress and politician Melina Mercouri claimed to have consummated her first
marriage there.
Ottoman remains
Near
Platía Syndágmatos
, three converted
Ottoman mosques
survive: one, the Trianón,
in the southeast corner of the square, is an occasional theatre and cinema; another, the
Vouleftikón, just off the southwest corner, was the modern Greek state's original
Voulí
(parliament building). A third, fronting nearby Plapoúta, was reconsecrated as the
cathedral of
Áyios Yeóryios
, having started life as a Venetian Catholic church. Nearby are
a pair of handsome
Turkish fountains
- one abutting the south wall of the theatre-
mosque, the other on Kapodhistría, opposite the church of Áyios Spyrídhon. On the
steps of the latter, president Ioannis Kapodhistrías was assassinated by two of the
Mavromihalis clan from the Máni in September 1831; there is a scar left in the stone by
one of the bullets. The Catholic church, which has also been a mosque, on Potamiánou,
has a monument to foreigners who died in the War of Independence, including Byron.
Archeological museum
Tues-Sun 8.30am-3pm • €2
Náfplio's
archeological museum
occupies a dignified Venetian mansion at the western
end of Syndágmatos. It has some good collections, as you'd expect in a town near the
Argolid sites, including a unique and more or less complete suit of
Mycenaean armour
,
the Dendra cuirass from around 1400 BC, wonderful, birdlike Mycenaean
female
figurines,
, and reconstructed
frescoes
from Tiryns.
Peloponnesian Folklore Foundation Museum
Vassiléos Alexándhrou 1 • Mon, Wed-Sun 9am-3pm, closed Feb • €2
The fine
Peloponnesian Folklore Foundation Museum
features gorgeous embroideries,
costumes and traditional household items from all over Greece. The exotic verve of
both women's and men's finery is nothing less than dazzling, and there are also entire
period rooms re-created, down to the last detail.
