YIÁLOVA , 6km north out of Pylos, has tamarisk trees shading its sandy beach and is a delightful base for walkers, naturalists or beach-lovers. The Navarino Beach   campsite (tel 07230/22 761; April-Oct) has good facilities including a recommended restaurant, and is popular with windsurfers. Nearer the central jetty there are two hotels : the delightful Zoe (tel 07230/22 025; ¬34-42), with one of the best views in Greece, and Helonaki House (tel 07230/23 080; ¬34-42) with a variety of rooms and apartments. The Zoe also has the Voula Apartments (¬34-42) back towards Pylos. For eating, you can't beat the excellent home cooking at Oasis by the corner of the pier, almost next door to the Zoe . There is a small shop for picnic supplies between the Oasis and the main road; further along the main road is more, though less well-positioned, accommodation.

 

Pylos's northern castle, and ancient acropolis, Kástro Navarínou (Paleó Kástro), stands on a hill ridge almost touching the island of Sfaktiría, at the end of the bay 5km west of Yiálova. It has substantial walls, and identifiable courtyards and cisterns within fortifications which are a mix of Frankish and Venetian, set upon ancient foundations. The panoramic outlook is tremendous, but the interior is a jungle of shrubs and other vegetation that makes progress through it difficult. It's a ten- to twelve-kilometre trip from Pylos, for which you'll need some transport. To get there, follow the main road north towards Hóra, but when the road swings right to Korifássi, go left on a side road signed to Romanós and Navarino castle. If you find your way, you will end up at one of the best beaches in the Peloponnese - a lovely crescent of sand curling around the spectacular Bay of Voïdhokiliá . A simpler alternative is to go north through Yiálova, turn left at the sign to Voïdhokiliá and Golden Beach (the Pylos-Hóra bus will bring you this far); at the end of the surfaced road, go left until the dirt road ends below the castle hill. From here head right along the footpath between the lagoon and the hill until you reach the Voïdhokiliá dunes and beach. The lagoon is an important bird conservation area under NATURA 2000, and vehicles are not allowed on the earth road around the eastern rim of the lagoon. Near the end of the asphalt, a signed nature trail has been laid out. Turtles still breed at Voïdhokiliá (and at the beaches of Romanoú and Máti, further north), but a small population - the only one in mainland Europe - of slow-moving chameleons amongst the dune shrubs is endangered by illegal drivers and camper vans.

A path from the Voïdhokiliá dunes ascends to the Spílio tou Nestóros (Nestor's Cave), and then more steeply up to the castle. This impressive bat-cave with a hole in the roof is fancifully identified as the grotto in which, according to the Odyssey , Nestor and Neleus kept their cows, and in which Hermes hid Apollo's cattle. It is not impossible that the cave sparked Homer's imagination, for this area is reckoned by archeologists to have been the Mycenaean-era harbour of King Nestor, and later of the Classical town of Korifasio.