Spina, Folegandros: Our Night on the Edge of Ambeli Bay
The note in our room made a gentle suggestion… wake up early, walk down barefoot to the shore and get into the sea before doing anything else. So the next morning that's exactly what we did, and we had Ambeli Bay entirely to ourselves. The water was clear enough to count the pebbles on the seabed; there wasn't another soul on the beach, and the only sound was the sea nudging at the rocks.
That swim was the reward for a slightly cheeky request. Earlier in our trip we'd eaten at Spina's Osteria, a charcoal-fired, garden-fed tasting menu on a clifftop at the far north-western tip of Folegandros (you can read about the meal in our Spina restaurant review). We left so taken with the place that we got in touch to ask whether they had any space. Luckily there'd been a cancellation, so they squeezed us in, which also rescued us from the slightly smelly Airbnb we'd originally booked.
We're so glad it worked out, because our night at Spina turned out to be one of the highlights of our whole trip. If you're planning a trip to Folegandros yourselves, we can't recommend it highly enough, and you can book directly through their website here.
As always, we're being transparent: Spina gave us this room free of charge, knowing about Hungry Soles. Despite that, we hope this post shows we genuinely loved this place! All words are our own, and the owners are reading this at the same time as you.
The story behind Spina
Spina is the work of two Italians who spent the best part of twenty summers on Folegandros before deciding to build something of their own. Matteo Serri is a photographer and keen sailor, while Alessandro Pagnoni, known to all as Alle, is a chef who trained at Franceschetta58, Massimo Bottura's more casual restaurant in Modena, where the cooking is rooted in Emilian tradition.
It was a local fisherman, Minos, who first took them by boat to Ambeli, a tiny pebbly cove at the far end of the island, and they never really recovered. After almost a decade of planning and building into the rock with local stone, Spina opened in 2024 as five suites and an osteria. The name is Italian for "thorn", after the wild thistles that push up between the rocks here, which the owners see as the emblem of the island.
The team that runs it day to day, from Giulia on hospitality to the kitchen, is largely Italian too, and that's a big part of the charm: Italian warmth and an Italian osteria, rooted entirely in a Greek island, its produce and its pace. We go into the story, and the food that comes out of it, in much more detail in our Spina restaurant review.
The suites
Spina has just five suites, built from local stone and wood into the rock above the bay, and the first thing you notice is what isn't there. There's no air conditioning and no minibar, and the whole place runs on solar power, with a backup for the days when the panels can't keep up.
Our room
What you get instead is a ceiling fan, linen sheets, a properly comfortable bed and a private terrace facing the sea. It manages to feel completely at one with the landscape while still being, unmistakably, a well-designed space.
Our suite was at the far end of the site, set furthest back from the water, and it still had the view. It's pared back without ever being cold, and the environment makes you want to put your phone in a drawer and forget about the outside world. Everything in the room is also for sale, sourced from Hippie Bazaar, a shop on the island, so if you fall for the rug or the ceramics, you can take them home with you.
Each room also has an outdoor shower, which we love! Rinsing off under an open sky with the Aegean in front of you is the sort of thing that ruins ordinary bathrooms for weeks afterwards.
An afternoon at the bar, then off to cook
After checking in, we perched ourselves at the Osteria’s bar, a long concrete counter looking out over the bay, and the perfect spot to settle in with a drink. We'd brought along the map left in our room, Spina's own beautifully designed guide to Folegandros, marked up with the team's local recommendations, and we pored over it while planning the second half of our Folegandros trip.
Then we headed off for a cooking class at O Mimi's, which deserves (and will be getting) its own post. It's worth saying, though, that staying at the northern tip of the island doesn't cut you off from anything. Folegandros is small enough that nowhere is really far, and Spina works well as a base for exploring it as much as a place to hide away.
Sunset at the Osteria
Having already worked our way through the tasting menu on our earlier visit, this time we kept it simple and propped ourselves up at the bar with a drink while dinner service got going around us. Just beyond the bar, the kitchen works in the open air, a row of charcoal ovens set among dry-stone walls and wild scrub.
We started with a classic Campari Negroni with a twist of orange, and for wine we did what we'd recommend anyone does at Spina: told the sommelier what we liked and let them choose. It's a list worth surrendering to, heavy on natural and low-intervention bottles from Italy and Greece.
Our drinks arrived with a little plate of plump dark olives and a couple of cheeses. Then, because the bar was quiet while service carried on, the team kindly sent over a few of the appetiser courses from the dinner menu (you'll find them in our restaurant review). It wasn't something we asked for or would expect, but it was a lovely gesture and very much in keeping with how they look after people here.
Once the sun had slipped into the sea, we stayed put a while longer, watching the colour drain from the cliffs, before wandering back to our room to wind down. With nothing else around this far north, the stars came out in force, and we spent the rest of the evening gazing at the sky and switching off.
Ambeli Bay before anyone else
Every room has a card titled "An Invitation to Care", and it's worth reading properly because it explains how Spina actually works. The place is entirely self-sufficient: electricity comes from the solar panels, fresh water is collected from the winter rains and treated, plastic is avoided, and all waste is recycled. Nothing goes down the toilet, not even loo roll, which is standard practice across the Cyclades.
The Cyclades have always been short of fresh water, and islanders traditionally caught the rain from rooftops and paved yards and stored it in underground cisterns to see them through the dry months, Folegandros included. Spina's rainwater system is the same idea, and it changes how you think about every minute under that outdoor shower.
Which brings us back to our early morning swim. While we were drying off on the rocks, Matteo, one of Spina's founders, and Giulia, their hospitality manager, came down to the beach and started picking up cigarette butts, which they told us locals leave behind far too often. It was a small thing to witness, but it said more about Spina than any card in a room could: these are people who genuinely care about the patch of coast they've built on, and about the mark the rest of us leave on it.
Breakfast from chef Alle
Chef Alessandro Pagnoni, who also runs the kitchen at dinner, puts together a short, considered breakfast menu. Greek yoghurt with honey, nuts and fruit, chia pudding, a cake of the day, a Spina toast of shokupan with Naxos cheese and ham, and home-baked shokupan brioche with butter and freshly made marmalade. A line at the bottom of the menu explains that the produce comes from their own gardens in the valley, from the island, and from organic suppliers.
We both went for the Greek omelette (€12), folded around crumbled feta and roasted tomatoes and served with toasted shokupan, the soft, slightly sweet Japanese milk bread that turns up all over the menu. Finding it on a Greek island, cooked by an Italian chef, sums Spina up rather neatly: it's an authentically Greek setting run by Italians who aren't shy about borrowing whatever's good. Like everything else here, it matched the standard of the dinner we'd already written about, which is high praise.
Getting there
Spina sits at the far north-western tip of Folegandros, about a 25-minute drive from Chora, out past Ano Meria and down a rough dirt track to Ambeli. No bus routes come all the way out here, so having your own transport makes life much easier. The last stretch is steep, bumpy and gravelly, and if you're a nervous driver it will certainly get your attention.
If you don't have a car, you can take the bus as far as Ano Meria and speak to the team about getting from there to the suites.
If you do drive, the road is entirely manageable. We did it several times in a very, very old rented Nissan Micra, which handled it with rather more dignity than we'd expected. Hire something you have confidence in, or go for an ATV, and take it slowly. That remoteness is precisely the appeal: you're never far from the rest of the island, but once you're down there, the evenings are yours, and so is the bay.
Good to know
Price: around €260 a night when we stayed. With only five suites, book well ahead.
Season: Spina is seasonal, open roughly from May to October, so check exact dates with them before planning around it.
Ask the team: they're genuinely happy to help with logistics, so if you're unsure about anything from directions to timings, just message them.
Transport: your own car or ATV is by far the easiest option. Allow about 25 minutes from Chora and take the final dirt track slowly. Without wheels, take the bus to Ano Meria and ask the team about the last stretch.
Eat there: book a table at the Osteria for dinner if you're staying; it's the reason we fell for Spina in the first place. Breakfast is served on site too, and it's worth getting up for.
No air con: you get a ceiling fan, sea breezes and thick stone walls. If you can't sleep without air conditioning, think twice about the hottest weeks of summer.
Mind the rules: nothing goes down the toilet, and the water is collected rainwater, so keep showers sensible.
Swim early: head down to Ambeli before breakfast and there's every chance you'll have the cove to yourselves. The path is short but rocky, so wear something with grip.
Who it suits: couples and food lovers who want to switch off. If you want nightlife or a pool scene, stay in Chora and come up for dinner instead.
Our verdict
Most hotels try to win you over by giving you more. Spina does it by giving you less: fewer rooms, no air con, no plastic, no noise, and in return a cove to yourselves at dawn and a breakfast worth climbing out of the sea for. If you're heading to Folegandros and you travel for what's on the plate as much as the view, give yourselves at least one night here.
