Simon Ward travels to northern Greece to discover a resort within a resort that offers personal luxury on a grand scale...
Situated on the Kassandra peninsula in Halkidiki, northern Greece, Sani Asterias offers modern luxury with bells on, with 59 villas and residences arranged around gated gardens lined with Mediterranean herbs, flowers and trees. Each of the residences has spacious interiors finished in warm creams, sand and rich mushroom hues, with sliding glass doors at the rear of each property either leading onto the hotel’s immaculate white-sand private beach or a large, lounger-lined pool. A new addition for this season, seven 180-square-metre, three-bedroom residences offer super-sized versions of its neighbouring properties, with huge manicured grounds, private pool and a seamless indoor/outdoor flow.
The hotel’s focal point is a large heated pool festooned with friendly staff ready to pour or serve whatever you desire from the adjoining Water restaurant, another new opening for 2026. Under the watchful eye of two-Michelin-starred chef Bruno Oger, the restaurant focuses on exquisite, refined food in a relaxed semi-alfresco setting. Expansive breakfast buffets are laid out before the bleary-eyed guests, with local pastries, traditional Greek egg dishes, healthy (and not so healthy) smoothies or even a cheeky glass of fizz tantalisingly displayed. In the evening, the space transforms, offering langoustine, bluefin tuna tartare, roasted turbot in brown butter and truffle raviolini on its small but well-curated menu. The waiting staff here are knowledgeable and happy to recommend dishes – the sommelier chose a beautifully crisp 2022 Sancerre for us after spying our furrowed brows while poring over the wine list.
Sounds pretty serene already, right? But that’s just a fifth of the story, for if you step through Asterias’ gated border you step into Sani Resort proper: four adjoining sister hotels providing a bewildering amount of choice. Here you’ll find 26 bars and restaurants, several private beaches, three spas, a couple of gyms, mainland Greece’s largest heated outdoor pool (and 18 other pools, if you’re feeling fussy), forest trails, even its own church and 215-slip marina. The scale here is truly dizzying, but even more impressive is how Sani has managed to operate at such a large scale while retaining the personal, luxurious touch.
Where to start with the activities on offer? You can start your day with a morning breathwork session on a yoga platform above the beach or a guided 5K run through the pine forest before indulging in a sauna and “emotional shower” in the spa. Children can brush up their skills at the Rafa Nadal Tennis Centre, the Chelsea FC Football Academy or the Bear Grylls Survival Academy. There’s also snorkelling, water skiing, boat cruises and cycling alongside the nearby wetlands to spot diving kingfishers and wading storks.
Sani’s fleet of Volvo XC90s are also at your disposal to take you on an engrossing tour of the peninsula, with its accompanying olive groves, ancient wells and tales of local Greek legend. There’s a lot to choose from, making it perfect for couples, groups or families looking for an active break without skimping on the luxury.
Even if you only came for the relative isolation of Sani Asterias, it’s still well worth venturing over its frontier if only to sample some of the wider resort’s incredible culinary offerings. Of the 26 eateries to choose from, we found everything from pasta and souvlaki to Thai fusion and sushi/sashimi bars. The two restaurants we visited during our stay were both stunning. Lima, located on a spacious veranda in Porto Sani, serves delicious Peruvian cuisine – our huge portions of snow crab tacos, shrimp tempura and Chilean sea bass in creamy white corn, with heaps of latin spice and citrus zing, were a highlight. The following evening, at Avli on the marina, we indulged in Greek cuisine cooked over open flames: charred artichokes, octopus skewers and prime rib-eye were presented with a convivial flourish alongside a deliciously smoky bottle of local Cabernet Sauvignon from Mega Spilio Estate.
After dipping into the Sani Resort experience and its vast range of offerings, it feels reassuring to return to the resort-within-a-resort haven that is Asterias, curated with a real sense of independence from the larger operation by general manager Kevin Kainz and his team. There’s quite enough to keep you more than satisfied here for your entire stay (I haven’t even mentioned its boutique spa and extensive range of treatments and rituals yet), but with such choice and temptation on the other side of the hotel’s gates, why not just take the best of both worlds?