Black Bird
Beach Bar

Little Banana is the pocket cove behind the rocks at the end of Banana Beach, down at the far southwest tip of Skiathos, and Black Bird is the only bar standing on it. The offer is short and confident: rented sunbeds, upbeat music from late morning, and a drinks list that runs far longer than the food menu. The crowd skews young and free spirited, which is precisely what the operator promises for this bar, and for once the beach delivers the brochure.

We put the same two questions to every venue on the Skiathos club directory: what does the paid day cost, and what does the unpaid version look like. Black Bird makes the first question genuinely difficult, because no price appears anywhere we can verify, and the second question refreshingly simple, because the cove is public sand and admission costs nothing beyond the sweat of the walk in.

Every value judgment about Black Bird flows from a single fact: no car, bus or scooter reaches this sand. The twenty minute walk from the Koukounaries bus stop, finishing with a steep hundred metre drop to the cove, filters out everyone who wanted convenience, and what survives the filter is a beach day with elbow room in weeks when the big crescent next door is shoulder to shoulder. You are paying for that filter with your legs, and in August it is the best trade on the island.

The money side demands more caution than usual. Because the bar publishes nothing, you cannot budget a bed before you go, and because it is the only operation on the cove, there is no competitor ten metres away to keep the number sensible. Our rule for monopoly coves is simple: ask the price out loud before your towel touches the bed, and if the answer surprises you, the free half of the sand is right there and the sea is identical. Drinks run on the usual island logic, cold, plentiful and priced for a captive audience, so a long afternoon adds up one glass at a time.

Where Black Bird falls short is reliability at the edges of summer. The operator opened the 2026 season on 23 May, weeks after the island’s first warm swimming days, and says openly that the bar runs only as weather and season allow. Walk in on a marginal June morning and you may find the shutters closed, which on an unserviced cove means no water, no shade and no toilet unless you carried your own plan. High season visitors will never notice, shoulder season walkers should check before committing the legs.

The cove itself is a short arc of fine gold sand between two rocky arms, with water that stays calm and clear on most summer days because the headlands take the wind. Its naturist history goes back decades and survives comfortably alongside the bar crowd, split by an unspoken line partway down the beach. Scramble over the rocks to the north and the full sweep of Big Banana opens up, with its louder bars and water sports. Our Little Banana guide reads the swimming, the light and the etiquette in full.

Ride the island bus to its last stop, number 26 at Koukounaries, about twelve kilometres from Skiathos Town, then take the paved road on foot over the headland, roughly twenty minutes with a hilly middle stretch and a steep final hundred metres down to the sand. Summer beach boats from the old port reach Koukounaries too, which shortens nothing but beats standing on a bus. There is no parking at the cove itself, so drivers leave the car at Koukounaries and join the same walk.

Beds go to whoever walks in first, and on August mornings the front row is settled before noon. If you would rather make the walk knowing a bed is waiting, drop your date and group into the form below and we put the question straight to the bar, which can then confirm space and quote the going rate for your day. It costs nothing and it swaps guesswork for a number.