This Greek destination is the perfect blend of ancient and new - and the ultimate family holiday spot

Daily Mail​

09-06-2025

As bath times go, it falls short of a Churchillian soak. But the three thousand year old terracotta tub, lined with spiral motifs and roughly the size of a double Belfast sink, brims with majesty and myth.
For it was here, I tell my family dragooned into a morning tour of Greece 's best preserved Mycenaean palace, that Telemachus is said to have been bathed by King Nestor's youngest daughter after arriving at the elderly warrior's pile desperate for news of his missing father Odysseus, still not home from the Trojan War.
'Not much room to lie down, is there?' ponders Felix, 13.
No, son, but with a panorama like this who can blame Homer's oldest and wisest hero for installing a unit that requires you to bathe bolt upright?
With sweeping views of Navarino Bay and the sparkling Ionian Sea, this B.C. bathroom looks out onto heaven.
Olive groves as far as the eye can see; perfect unspoiled sands. Not to mention, in an adjoining room, remnants of a wine store fit for Dionysius himself.
No wonder, legend has it, Nestor lived for three generations.
Similar life enhancing values can be found a few kilometres down the hill at the Costa Navarino resort, a high end collection of world class hotels that include the Peloponnese's first Mandarin Oriental, which blends Homeric hospitality with a sensitivity to landscape and heritage.
Founded by Captain Vassilis Constantakopoulos, a shipping company owner and keen environmentalist, his vision was to create a destination that would have sustainability and Messinian culture at its heart.
We are staying at the W Costa Navarino, the newest addition to his luxury tribe, where the old is thoughtfully mixed with the brand, spanking new.
The spacious central lobby is a case in point: soft grey local stone walls are offset by gleaming floor to ceiling glass doors through which two perfectly appointed infinity pools call like Sirens luring us in for a swim.
Without my glasses on, I spy what seems to be a collage of post-it notes covering the wall behind the reception desk.
Turns out, it's a modern tableaux of Linear-B, a homage to the script discovered on clay tablets in Nestor's Palace and the earliest known form of Greek.
See, kids? Classics can be cool.
'It is here,' concedes Evie, 17, so impressed by her trendy surroundings that her noise/parent cancelling headphones, worn every minute of the three hour drive from Athens airport, finally slide down to her shoulders.
It may be nudging thirty degrees, but there's no mistaking the cool vibe among the clientele. If it weren't for the luggage, I'd think we'd stumbled in on a fashion shoot.
The pool table in the adjoining W Lounge, home to the funky main bar and games area, has caught Felix's attention. I'm drawn to the stylish shelving units dotted with glossy design books and objets d'art. My husband, as ever, has an eye on lunch.
Five minutes later, we're tucking into the tastiest Greek salad and a moreish house white as we sit on the terrace overlooking the sea.
Thanks to the islet of Spacteria, which acts as a windbreaker, Navarino Bay is blissfully sheltered from the gusts that can grate with even the most devout Grecophile.
I could sit here all day – if the hipsters would let me.
Our interconnecting rooms, with gorgeous views of the sea, are light, bright and modern while also being highly absorbent of family mess – a conclusion I come to after a massage at the spa that leaves me comatose with calm.
Down at the beachfront pool, the air of serenity continues - a fact my husband puts down to the absence of little ones, as the hotel only permits guests over the age of 12. Parents of toddlers, your time will come. Parents of teens, rejoice; for Costa Navarino has pretty much thought of everything.
While days can be spent in a blur of water sports, golf (there are four immaculate courses), tennis, padel and pickleball, nights are enlivened by DJ sets in the central agora for which you can even rent your own statement party outfit. I keep this information to myself.
For having tasted dinner at Parelia, a casual-cool beachside restaurant with the sort of oversized wicker lanterns that have me mentally stripping out the dated kitchen spotlights at home, I have no further need of evening entertainment.
How could I in the face of its giant pan of ambrosial lamb, garnished with the best part of a rosemary bush and potatoes to die for?
The dish would comfortably feed a family for a week. Not for the first time, I look at mine and wonder how half of them ended up vegetarian.
Felix, my only carnivore, blinks at the tower of meat before him and vows to do his best.
Our final day and we are coaxed out of our comfort zone for a cycling/hiking tour courtesy of Navarino Outdoors.
Our charming guide Dinos, an astro-physicist about to start the olive picking season, cycles us to Voidokoilia beach via the flamingos of Limnothalassa lake.
It's a beautiful spot, framed by the ruins of Old Navarino Castle and prompts him to break into song. I'm half expecting a Greek folk tune and am taken aback when I recognise the number: Ed Sheeran's Castle on the Hill.
It's faintly surreal but we applaud and he laughs. Once again, with the lightest touch, ancient and modern align.