Mystery Skiathos Luxury Residence

We stayed here for one night at the beginning and end of our trip across to Skopelos. It's a perfect spot, close to town. Lovely staff, nice accommodation, and wonderful views. We felt very well looked after, and staff were very friendly. The pool is a nice bonus, we were there in summer and it never felt too busy. Thank you for a wonderful stay.

Probably the loveliest hotel we have ever stayed in. Small and quiet, felt a bit like being at your own villa. Everything kept super clean. Food in the hotel restaurant was amazing, special mention to the lamb. Staff were all fantastic, specifically Katerina who treated us like family. Location was very convenient with an amazing view from your balcony. We really enjoyed our chilled drinks there. Special mention to the super comfortable beds, you wouldn't want to get up!

I stayed here in July 2024 with my wife and our two teenage daughters. We were seduced by the description and photo's of the 'Grand Villa' and booked for a week at not inconsiderable cost. We have stayed in Skiathos several times before and have an idea of the typical quality of hotels in Skiathos, Greece more widely and across Europe. This isn't a bad hotel but sadly it doesn't live up to its own 'luxury' tag and the photographs available on their own website and on-line elsewhere are quite out of date. First thing to note is that the hotel is being expanded (at least doubled) and whilst this work is not taking place over the summer it does mean that half the hotel is a building site and that the promised views across Skiathos town are now replaced by a building for some rooms. I have no problem with expanding - that's a good thing but there is no mention of this anywhere, I understand its not something you necessarily want to shout about but leaving the photo's online of the hotel as it was and the descriptions of the surroundings and views isn't fair when people book and pay a lot of money to stay here. The service is OK, the staff are very attentive and polite but I have stayed in hotels were the staff are proactive in taking drinks orders around the pool etc. At Mystery they only really have one or two staff around all day so they don't really have time for this. They also have a restaurant on-site and the food choice for dinner looks good but during the day the 'light' snacks are pretty limited and quite expensive so eating lunch in the hotel wasn't really a practical option for us. They advertise wi-fi throughout the hotel and it is true that for 75% of the time it was possible to see and connect to the wi-fi. However of this 75% I would say 95% of the time I just got 'no internet' once connected so it was next to useless. Over the week I did manage to connect once, for about 10 minutes and the speed was about 1mb/s. I know its Greece and its semi-rural but other bars and hotels (even the beach) had free wi-fi which was perfectly stable and 8-10mb/s speed (including the hotel over the road) so I think its their infrastructure that is the problem and that is something they should do something about if they are promoting that they have wi-fi and charging the amount they do for their rooms. They provide breakfast which was nice and offered a reasonably good choice. Others have suggested breakfast was available in-room but this wasn't offered to us and I don't see how they can do this with just one person serving so I suspect this is no longer an option. It didn't matter to us as we didn't have room to eat breakfast anyway (see my room review later). Its a bit of a pain having to choose breakfast the night before and sticking to an agreed time but I understand why they do this. As for the pool its very small (although it does seem they are extending this) and there are woefully few sunbeds for the number of rooms and potential guests. This means you need to be up early to get a bed and a number of people each day will have to accept there is no room around the pool (as it was for us ). They need more sunbeds and space, this will come when they expand but this will also bring twice the guests so I suspect this will continue to be a problem. The challenge is this is a small footprint hotel and space is limited all round. Now for our accommodation. We booked to stay in the Grand Villa a 2 bed, multi-level room with a hot tub. This is indeed what we got. However it is not 'grand' or a 'villa' and it certainly isn't 'luxury'. It's really just two basic rooms connected with a staircase. The 'room' is a good size but its pretty sparse and bland. The lower level has a bedroom with a (comfortable) large double-bed, a far too small wardrobe, a wall mounted head-height mirror (there is no full length mirror in the room apart from a slim one inside the wardrobe door which isn't very practical), a slim dressing table with no chair, two bedside tables and a small balcony with a table and two chairs overlooking the back of the hotel. The 'living' area has a sofa (which we had converted into a very uncomfortable bed) a small, basic flat screen TV, a small table with two chairs, another slim dressing table a sink, mini-bar (well stocked but small) a kettle and some mugs and tea spoons. There is another small balcony with two chairs and a table. Upstairs in the loft room there is a standard double, dressing table, wardrobe and an on-suite. This room leads out through a 4ft window to the sun terrace which includes the hot tub. Summaries pro's and con's of the Grand Villa Pro's 2 bedrooms + sofa bed- sleeps up to 6 3 balconies/terrace Hot tub Mini-bar (chargeable) Excellent air conditioning Serviced daily Two bathrooms Loads of towels provided Loads of toiletries Tea & coffee making facilities Con's Sofa-bed is uncomfortable Balconies are small and there is nowhere for 4 people, let alone 6 people to sit outside together Hot tub is boiling (as you might expect) and pretty pointless - it just uses up space which could be used for additional seating/sun loungers. We never used it. Mini-bar is tiny and whilst you can remove stuff to put your own drinks in there is very little space and no freezer No crockery or anything to use if you want to eat in the room (although there isn't anywhere to eat together really anyway) Towels were very rough (dried outside I assume) Toiletries were topped up everyday but no attention was paid to what they topped up with. By the end we had 12 body lotions, 8 shampoos and 6 conditioners but no shower gel! No tea/coffee is supplied for the kettle Downstairs bathroom has a bath with a proper shower but the bath is only covered at one end so using the shower soaks everything. The upstairs bathroom has a proper shower cubicle but only a waist-height hand held shower - all a bit topsy turvy! Wi-fi was basically non-existent No full length mirror which the girls could sit in-front of Views from the main level were blocked by a recently built building The photo's and schematic on-line of the Grand Villa interior are not the Grand Villa (check out my photos for the reality) All in all we loved Skiathos and whilst I wouldnt strongly advise against staying here I wouldnt stay again. For what I paid I feel a bit deceived by the photo's and description. If I had known I would have booked two good rooms elsewhere for about the same and had more space and probably a better ambience. If it were half what I paid for it then it would still have been in the higher-cost bracket for Skiathos and I might have given it 4 stars. Because it cost so very much for so basic a room I have given it a 3.

What an amazing boutique hotel. The pool was just the right temperature, comfy sunbeds (loved the attached pillows), amazing staff, great drinks and food menu, brilliant breakfast, spotlessly clean, modern room with electric curtains, smart tv, balcony, waterfall shower etc etc etc. We only stayed for 2 nights but would definitely return for longer.

Skiathos was a great trip for me, but it was made even more special with the stay in Mystery. Located just few meters away from the center of Skiathos and Evagelistrias Street its ideal for both the relaxed traveler and the one who likes to explore the town of Skiathos with restaurants and different bars. The staff makes you feel like home. Thank you we will come again.