Start Planning for a Spring Trip to Greece’s Peach Blossom Festival

Planning a trip to Greece in spring? It’s a great time to go — the weather isn’t too hot, the prices aren’t too high and the crowds aren’t too overwhelming. There are also some pretty interesting things to do, like visit Veria for the annual Budding Peach Blossom Festival.

Located in Northern Greece in the Imathia region of Central Macedonia, this area is famous for its delicious peaches. The landscape is dotted with orchard after orchard, where more than 150 varieties thrive. When the trees begin to emerge from their winter slumber, the otherwise green and brown landscape is transformed into a blanket of vibrant pinks as far as the eye can see.

Just as Japan welcomes spring (and hordes of visitors) with its cherry blossom festivals, the Veria festival, only a few years old, welcomes visitors from around the world to experience the beauty of its rural countryside, historically and culturally significant sites, mouthwatering farm-to-table Greek cuisine and vast fields of blossoming peach trees.

Visitors can picnic under the trees while they enjoy the sunshine and cool breeze, or they can explore the area on a bike ride that starts in the town of Veria and winds through the orchards under the snow-capped Pierian Mountains. The activity quickly becoming the most popular event of the festival is the photo contest, which draws hundreds of amateur photographers hoping to capture the best shots of the emerging blossoms.

While the dates for the 2024 festival have yet to be announced, the event will take place over a 10-day period in March when the peach trees blossom. Now is the perfect time to start your planning so you don’t miss out on any of the sites or attractions in the area, such as the traditional Jewish Quarter of Barbouta, known as “Little Jerusalem,” or the archaeological site of Vergina.