The staircase
Hundreds of steps climbing the rock face from town to summit.
Jean Housen โ CC BY-SA 4.0 ยท Jean Housen โ CC BY-SA 4.0 ยท Jean Housen โ CC BY-SA 4.0 ยท Jean Housen โ CC BY-SA 4.0
Entry is **about โฌ8**. โ **The staircase is the challenge**: it is said to have **999 steps** (the actual count is around **857**, depending how you count) and takes **25โ40 minutes** for a regular walker, **with no shade at all**. โ **Do not climb it between 10 and 5 in July or August** โ the heat on those steps is genuinely dangerous; dawn or late afternoon only. โ **The alternative: a surfaced road to a car park at the summit** โ drive or take a taxi and enter by the upper gate; this is what older visitors, anyone with mobility difficulty and families with small children should do. โ **The cleverest arrangement**: **taxi up and walk down** โ the descent is a fraction of the effort and the view is in front of you the whole way. โ **Inside the fortress the ground is uneven**, with steps, ramps and open edges in places โ take care with children. Carry **water**; there is nothing at the top.
๐ฌ Ask on WhatsAppOpen in Google Maps โ**A Venetian fortress on a rock summit 216 m above the town** โ and the thing it is famous for is **the staircase up to it**. The Venetians built it in **1711โ1714**, remarkably fast, and it is not one fort but **eight independent bastions** supporting one another, each able to hold out if its neighbour fell โ advanced military design for its day. The best known are **Agios Andreas** and **Miltiades**, the latter later used as a **prison**. โ The irony is that the Ottomans took it **one year** after it was finished, in 1715. In the War of Independence it became a symbol: the revolutionaries stormed it in **1822**, and the national hero **Theodoros Kolokotronis** was later imprisoned here in a cell you can still visit. โ The view from the top is the finest in the Peloponnese: the whole old town, Bourtzi out in the water, and the Argolic Gulf running to the mountains. โ And the climb on foot is **hundreds of steps** โ or you drive to the summit.
Hundreds of steps climbing the rock face from town to summit.
Used as a prison, and holding Kolokotronis's cell.
The old town, Bourtzi and the Argolic Gulf in one sweep.
Palamidi, 21100 Nafplio, Greece
**A famous figure, but approximate; the real count is lower.** โ **What counting gives**: people who actually count usually arrive at around **857** โ the discrepancy between counts arises because some short landings and ramps may or may not be counted as steps, and because the staircase has been **restored more than once**. โ **Where does 999 come from?** Largely from local tradition; the difference is sometimes attributed to "the steps Kolokotronis's horse ate" โ **an entertaining folk story rather than a historical account**. โ **What matters practically is not the number but the effort**: 25โ40 minutes of continuous climbing, **with no shade**, on steps of uneven height โ and that is what your decision should rest on, not the count. โ **A tip**: anyone who wants the experience without the punishment should **take a taxi up and walk down**.
**Palamidi โ clearly.** โ **Palamidi** is a complete fortress to visit: eight bastions, walls, passages and gates, Kolokotronis's cell, **the best view in the whole area**, and an hour and a half of real content. โ Its drawbacks: the charge, and the climb. โ **Acronauplia** is far older (Byzantine, Frankish, Venetian and Ottoman layers stacked on one another), **free**, and closer โ reached on foot from town or by a lift on the hotel side. โ But it is **much less rewarding as a visit**: part of it is occupied by a hotel, the remains are scattered and unexplained, and the view is good but inferior to Palamidi's. **The rule:** one slot โ Palamidi. Two โ Palamidi in the morning one day, and Acronauplia at sunset on another (it is free and close and costs you nothing).
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