St Paul’s Bay, Lindos: The Best View in Rhodes

St Paul’s Bay is the best view in Lindos, and we say that having stood on the Acropolis directly above it the day before. It is a near-enclosed sandy bay with cliffs wrapped around it, a tiny white chapel at the water’s edge, and a narrow gap out to the open sea.

Yet there are many bad reviews of the beautiful St Paul’s Bay from holidaymakers who headed there on a hot day and found the tiny beach to be an overcrowded, sweaty mess with more people than sand, and two sun beds going for a sting at €60 a day.

We did St Paul’s Bay differently, and had the most romantic evening there.

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When Is the Best Time to Visit St Paul’s Bay?

Visit St Paul’s Bay golden hour. We arrived around 6:30PM and the light on the cliffs was stunning. At this time in the evening, most people are leaving the beach to head to their hotels for a pre-dinner shower. It means the beach is significantly quieter than during the day.

In August, sunset isn’t until around 8PM, so if you had your heart set on a swim here under the Acropolis, you could do that with far fewer crowds around in the stretch between 5-8PM. It’s also not cold, as most August evenings stay consistently around 30°C.

The evening has a second advantage: we walked into Tambakio, the only restaurant on the beach, without queuing at 6:45PM. This is a sought-after eating spot thanks to its beautiful location, and by around 7:30PM there was a queue of about an hour. Peak dinner time here is later than you would think because of the heat.

Is St Paul’s Bay Better Than Lindos Beach?

St Paul’s Bay and Lindos Beach are on opposite sides of the same headland, and we enjoyed visiting both.

Lindos Beach is bigger, has a lovely shallow sandy entry, plenty of cafés with tables on the sand, and is overall much better for young children and families. It also has cheaper sun beds at €25 for two for the day. However, it gets very busy when the day boats arrive around 11AM. You can walk round the corner to rocky outcrops to get a space by the sea away from the bust beach.

St Paul’s Bay is far more dramatic. The view is stunning, it makes for better holiday snaps, has calmer water and better snorkelling. However, the sun beds and cabanas are very expensive. There is also a free rocky option round the corner. By day, both patches get very busy where the beach space is tiny — hence the many disappointed reviews online.

If you only have one afternoon, do Lindos Beach in the day and St Paul’s Bay at golden hour. That is by far the best combination.

St Paul’s Beaches

St Paul’s Bay has two beach areas which are divided by rocks. You could just about clamber over the rocks, but it’s safer to walk round by road. It would also be possible to swim across.

The Tambakio Side (prettier but stacked with sun beds)

The side of Paralia Agios Pavlos beach is where most people mean when they say St Paul’s Bay. There is one restaurant, Tambakio, sitting right on the water, sun beds covering most of the sand, and toilet and shower facilities.

The bay itself is free to visit — it is only the sun beds you pay for, and they are expensive. A cabana — the square box with the curtains — is €110 for the day. Two loungers together are €60. There is no hourly option, so it is a full day affair. It’s the most expensive sun bed hire we saw anywhere on Rhodes and personally felt it’s extortionate.

The Far Side: Mikros Gialos (open rocky outcrop)

On the other side of the bey is Mikros Gialos beach, which translates as ‘small bay,’ directly beneath the Acropolis cliffs. You reach it by walking back up towards the road and taking the turning down to the water. There are no sun beds, no toilet block and no facilities at all here — just a shower balanced somewhat precariously on the rocks. It is rocky underfoot rather than sandy.

This is the free option and it has a completely different crowd: younger, scruffier, towels-on-rocks, bring your own picnic. It is a good swimming spot.

Swimming at St Paul’s Bay

The water in the bay is clear and, because it is so enclosed, unusually calm. It is one of the better places to snorkel around Lindos, particularly along the rocky edges where the sandy-entry crowds do not go.

Sitting on the dock one evening we watched a lionfish come right up to the surface and display every fin, plus something we are fairly sure was a sea hare. Worth flagging on the lionfish: they are an invasive species spreading through the Mediterranean and their spines are venomous. Beautiful to watch, not to touch.

You can buy snorkelling gear in Lindos town easily enough if you did not bring any. Sea shoes are genuinely useful here given how much of the swimming is entered from rock.

Eating at St Paul’s Bay

Tambakio was better value than we expected given it’s coveted location and ‘upmarket’ look from the outside. Our dinner came to €51 for two, though we are vegetarian, and prices climb if you plan to eat fish, seafood or meat.

Rough prices from August 2026: linguine with vegetables €17, Greek salad €16, pita bread €2, a large beer €6.50, wine €7.90. That is only marginally above what we paid for the same things in Lindos town, which is not what we expected from a restaurant with a monopoly on the best view in the village!

The food was fairly good, but nothing to write home about. You’re here for the view and the ambience.

Watch the menu quirks. The menu pricing is somewhat inconsistent. A 500ml bottle of water was €1, but a litre was €5. Pita bread was €2, but hummus was €12. Read carefully rather than ordering by instinct. This is a wider pattern in Lindos and Tambakio is where we noticed it most sharply.

Do you need to book? The best tables are reservation only, as with everywhere in Lindos. If you do not mind sitting slightly back and arriving early then you can walk in. Further back tables still had lovely views over the bay but not the acropolis. If you want the water’s edge or to go at peak dinner time, book ahead.

The Chapel of Agios Pavlos

The little white chapel at the edge of St Paul’s bay is Agios Pavlos. St Paul is said to have landed here in around 51 AD, coming ashore through that narrow gap in the rocks to preach Christianity in Rhodes — the story goes that a bolt of lightning split the rock to let his ship through.

It is a working chapel and one of the most popular wedding venues on the island, which is worth knowing for two reasons. First, it is beautiful and worth walking over to look at. Second, if you arrive to find the area around it closed off, that is why.

People do get married at Agios Pavlos too. If you are researching this rather than just visiting: the chapel is small, it books up a long way ahead, and ceremonies are typically arranged through a local wedding planner or your hotel rather than directly. The setting — white chapel, enclosed bay, Acropolis on the cliff behind. Do budget for the fact that the bay stays open to the public around you.

How To Get To St Paul’s Bay

From the centre of Lindos, St Paul’s Bay is close. It’s about a 5 minute walk through town. From the quieter back of the village, where we stayed, it would be around 30 minutes on foot. Coming from the roadside there is a steep descent down to the bay.

We took a taxi from the back of town to St Paul’s Bay for €7, skipping the steepest hill and making our way down the pedestrian-only path into the bay.

If you are driving: Lindos village is pedestrianised, so you cannot drive down to the bay. You park in one of the paid car parks on the edge of the village and walk in. Expect to pay €7+ for the day, and arrive before 10AM in summer if you want a space near.

The walk back into Lindos town afterwards is easy and only slightly uphill, which makes the natural order of an evening: bay at golden hour, then dinner, a few drinks and a giggle, then walk up into the village for a few more drinks. We headed to Kava Kantina afterwards.

Where to Stay Near St Paul’s Bay

There is no accommodation on the bay itself, but the southern edge of Lindos village and the streets above the bay put you within a ten-minute walk, and a few small places have views straight down over it.

For the full picture on which part of Lindos to base yourself in, see our where to stay in Lindos guide.

More Lindos and Rhodes Guides

• Lindos Travel Guide — the full guide to the village, when to go and how it is laid out
• Best Things To Do in Lindos — everything worth your time
• Lindos Acropolis — tickets, timings and what the climb is like
• Kitesurfing at Prasonisi — the southern tip and how to get there
• Is Rhodes Expensive? — every euro we spent in five days