Red Beach
Dark red sand and cliffs at the foot of old volcanic flows.
Duration
1 hr 30 min – 3 hrs
Difficulty
●●○○○
Best time
In the morning
Open
Every day
Entry price
Free
The beach owes its colour to the cliff of scoria above it: iron-rich lava, oxidised, which crumbles and feeds the sand continuously. It is raw volcanic scenery, without vegetation, very unlike the rest of the island.
Access is by a short but exposed path cut into the cliff. The same crumbling that gives the colour produces rockfalls, and part of the beach has been officially closed more than once for that reason.
Getting there
In the south of the island, near Akrotiri. Bus from Fira to the car park, then a ten-minute path. Boats also call here from Akrotiri.
What to bring
- Walking shoes
Rules on site
The access path runs under an unstable cliff and rockfalls have injured people: respect the closures, they are not decorative. The sand is in fact coarse gravel, very uncomfortable barefoot.
Other places in Santorini
- Oia and its sunsetWhitewashed houses stepping down the cliff, blue domes above the caldera.
- Akrotiri archaeological siteA Minoan town buried by the eruption, its streets and multi-storey houses intact.
- Fira to Oia trailTen kilometres of ridge above the caldera, linking the two villages.
- The caldera by boatNea Kameni volcano, the hot springs and Thirassia, seen from the water.