nirvana t
DESTINATIONS GREECE | EUROPE
The carbon-neutral Sani Resort is setting the standard for
sustainable holidays in Greece, discovers Alice Barnes-Brown while staying at the newly renovated Porto Sani
he forests of Halkidiki are my happy place: sandy paths beneath my feet, the heady scent of Aleppo pine in the air and
a sparkling Thermaic Gulf beckoning through the trees. On the branches overhead, birds twitter seemingly in delight at the summer sun. “They’re very chatty today – there must be a lot of gossip,” whispers Ino, my eco-guide at Sani. Set in 1,000 acres of nature reserve, Sani is made up of five five-star hotels (Sani Beach, Sani Dunes, Sani Club, Sani Asterias and Porto Sani) set along four miles of glorious bay. It’s both a family resort and a bona fide luxe getaway – with sustainability credentials that are second to none. It became Greece’s first certified carbon-neutral
resort in 2020, and aims to be net zero by 2030. I bedded down at the just-renovated Porto Sani to try out the resort’s excellent range of free eco-activities and to see what ingenious new innovations are helping them slash their emissions.
NATURE AT WORK Ino and I emerge from the forest – currently being surveyed for its carbon-capturing capabilities – into the marshy Sani wetlands, home to about half of all the bird species found in Greece. Deftly as we can, we pick our way through the reeds to a lake. There’s a faint flap of wings as a coot makes a splash landing, while herons stand sentinel at the edge. We set up the binoculars to spy on a group of nesting cormorants. On our way back to Porto Sani, Ino shows off the Bee Spot, a peaceful wildflower garden that opened in May 2022. Built in collaboration with Greek NGO The Bee Camp, the honeycomb-shaped bee hotel gives parents and kids a chance to play pollen-themed games and discover how wild bees are crucial to both the local and global ecosystem. Another pillar of the Halkidiki landscape is the
olive tree – there are around six million here. On a different outing, Ino takes me and about 25 others to a fledgling grove of olive trees behind the resort,
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travelweekly.co.uk 31 AUGUST 2023 41
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