Wild Camping In Greece: Donoussa Island

This summer you decided to wild camping in Greece, in a beach on a dreamy island, but you still don’t know where. Ever heard about Donoussa? Prepare yourself because after this article, this small Greek island will be your next travel destination! We spend there 22 days in August 2019 doing wild camping, and yes it was one of the most memorable experiences we had. We decided to camp in two different beaches in the island of Donoussa and we have to say that waking up in front of such a clear blue sea is priceless. If you want to know more about Greek islands, check out this guide: it really made the difference for us! The time we spent there really changed us and we advise everybody to do free camping in Greece at least once in life. So, if you are wondering if it’s allowed to place your tent in amazing areas around Greece, here you’ll find all the answers to your questions. 

If around Europe free camping is mostly illegal, in Greece is tolerated. This means that it is not allowed, but a lot of people are doing it, especially Greeks. During summer all Greek islands are stormed by free campers with their tent ready to spend some night in amazing beaches with the best view on the sea. And all this, for free. An important thing to know before wild camping is that you’ll need a backpack. If you don’t own one yet, it’ll be really hard for you to reach wild camping spots with a normal luggage. We’re using this backpack since 2 years and it’s perfect whether you want wild camping or travel as a digital nomad. We have to specify a thing: there are two different types of wild camping in Greece. The first one is controlled free camping, this means you’re allowed to place your tent only in a determined place. On the other hand, you’ll have some comforts, for example toilets, showers and a taverna. The second option is uncontrolled wild camping. In this option , you’ll be free to camp pretty much everywhere you want, but you won’t have electricity, water and toilets. We experienced both types of camping and we can’t wait to share our experience with you. Are you ready? Keep on reading!

When we arrived in Donoussa the first place we camp in was Kedros beach. This small beach is really clean and has an incredibly clear water, but we decided to leave it just one night after we arrived. Why? Let me tell you the story. Kedros is organized like this: there are three fields behind the taverna where campers are allowed to stay. There is also a place where you can park your car or van coming from the road from the main village. All this is organized by the owner of the taverna that created a business over free camping giving showers, toilets and (expensive) food to the people camping behind his beach bar. Since we didn’t know that at the beginning, we placed our tent where we wanted until he came screaming “if you don’t camp where I tell you, I’ll call the police”. So, a little bit scared from his proposal we decided to place our tent in a pretty bad spot, with no shadow at all. During the night there was load music until 4am and at 8am we woke up in a tent at 40 degrees, under the hot Greek sun. The same morning we discovered that there is no police on the island and we decided to leave Kedros beach as soon as possible. We think that a lot of controlled wild camping look like this, so here we made a list of pros and cons of doing controlled free camping in Greece, and specially in Kedros.

If you have some more questions about wild camping in Donoussa and Greece, feel free to leave us a comment below or contact us. We’ll be happy to reply you!