Our Neighbours in Greece: Nisyros, Symi, Halki and Karpathos

    Our island of Tilos is part of a band of islands called the Dodecanese that hug the coast of Turkey.  Contrary to what you may think, that means Tilos is part of an archipelago of thirteen (not twelve) islands.  In our opinion, after touring them all, Tilos, with its four closest  neighbours – Nisyros, Symi, Halki and Karpathos – make a perfect pentagon of Greek island charm.

NISYROS

       Don’t let the curb appeal of Nisyros fool you; beyond the rambling concrete ferry landing and a few hotels pressed against the hillside nearby, here lies a town that teems with character, cats and labyrinth corners, and an island that seethes with history.

Town of Mandraki

    Mandraki, the main town, is situated by the sea, but only obliquely, as once you get caught up into its web of alleys, you are entwined in more cobblestones and ornate ironwork than fishermen’s nets.  Look more closely and you realize this is a Greek-for-Greeks’-town; the women’s clothing shops, the sporting shops, household appliances and hardware stores all service the year-round residents that populate this little town.  If you’re lucky, your winding route through the bouganvillea-bedecked corridors of the town may lead you past the

archeological museum, to the Moni Panagias Spilianis monastery perched cliff-side at the edge of town, and the Knights Hospitaller castle, one ledge higher.  Higher still is the Paleokastro, a Mycenean acropolis founded 3000 years ago, its ancient fortifications one of the best preserved in the Aegean.

    Opportunities for refreshment on your explorations through Mandraki are many, most on the seaside rood which leads from the ferry dock.  On the opposite side of the ferry landing sprawl a few hotels that cater to the tourists who actually spend a night or two on the island (most are daytrippers from Kos shuffling up to the volcano and back). Fortunately, we got to try out Three Brothers, a Nisyros treasure, owing to its warm and welcoming host, Aphrodite.

Village of Emporio

    Continue past the hotels and you are on the road to Nisyros’s main attraction, the youngest active volcano in Greece (its most recent eruption a mere 15,000 years ago).  On the way is one of the most photogenic towns in Greece, Emporio, high on a hilltop between the sea and the volcano.  Once virtually a ghost town, it is slowly reviving, with fine new masonry emerging amongst the picturesque wildflower strewn streets and staircases.  A hoist up the last few steps through the main thorough fare of town brings you to a sparkling white church, Taxiarchis, and, via a lovely tamarack bordered path, the monastery and

cemetery.  The path disappears down the hillside towards the centre of the caldera, one of the many trails around the island that inevitably finds their way to the mystical centre of the island.

Nikea and the Volcano

    Another village situated at the edge of the caldera is Nikea with its oft-photographed plaza, and the only volcanological museum in Greece. Even foot traffic seems blasphemous in this perfect fairy-tale floss of a square with its spires, domes, pastel latticework and shutters and exquisite stone mosaics; a consummate stage set! A spell only broken upon finding the path to the volcano and beginning your gritty 1000 metre descent through scree, gorse, dried creek beds and goat pastures.

    A small information centre marks the entrance to the largest volcanic crater (considered one of the largest hydro-thermal craters in the world) and a short walk on a boardwalk and marked path has you standing on its

bubbling surface.  Though a few of the steamy fumaroles are roped off, visitors have the ability to wander freely around the site.  Visiting out of season, with few other visitors on-site, makes the virtually tactile experience with a still-hissing dormant volcano  that much more memorable.

    A fifteen minute drive, along lonely windswept beaches, with glimmers of Tilos across the strait, brings us back to our hotel.  Nisyros is a compact island with a fascinating variety of sites to visit, trails and villages to explore.  And if you do that at an island pace, good chance you’ll fall in step with the locals and learn more about the island’s mystical and enduring heritage.

 

SYMI

    Inimitable, eye-popping Symi.  Ferries always list to one side when they approach this beauty; every passenger on board leaning

portside to drink in what has to be the most breathstopping harbour in all of Greece.  Its amphitheatre shape makes a perfect display case

of the Neo-Classical homes jostling for a view of the sea, their colours running one into the next, spilling down the hillside to the harbour.  The composite – homes, castles and monasteries and windmills perched high above, stone walkways winding down through the village, a flush of cafes and lights ringing the harbour, any manner of vessel pulled in for the night – is a three dimensional mural of astonishing artistry.

Exploring Yialos

    Alighting from the ferry into this fairyland says go!  If you’re not hunting down your accommodation options, starting at the beguiling staircase ascending from the ferry, you are making your way long the storied waterfront to gaze at the things that drew you here in the first place.  Was it the Italian architectural legacy, or the sponge, still harvested after all these

years (Symi was a sponge capital in Ottoman times), was it knowing that Symi would have every soy milk coffee or organic blackberry smoothie you could possibly expect to order in Greece, was it the 425 steps up to the monastery, or was it simply the chance to be part of the scene – the jocular yachtie, fisherman, coastguard and visitors-decamped-from-Rhodes tourist scene.  Indeed, be ready for the day-tripping crowds and the only way to escape the mid-day madness is to take the bus to the far side of the island to its other main attraction, Moni Taxiarhou Mihail Panormiti monastery. Known as being one of the few monasteries in Greece with its own commercial wharf, you’ll find it a little more active than the traditional hide-away-in-a-mountain-crevass monastery in Greece (especially on November 8, its saint’s anniversary day).  

Island Life

Leaving Yialos requires a certain amount of comfort with off-the-beaten track exploring; even the eastward-leaning harbour of Pedi next to the main town seems a tad forgotten in the wasteland of Symi’s stark and stony interior. Luckily we met of few of these hardier lot of travellers;  Lars and Peter, from the bike-and-boat excursion company known as Island Hopping (Insel Huepfen in German).  They had

embarked on the 5:30 a.m. boat from Tilos with us, and after a day of biking reconnaissance, were keen to meet up.  That meant half way up the 425 steps to the town’s monastery, to a restaurant whose terrace lights merged with the light emanating from the harbour below.  The meal was rambunctiously Greek, with copious amounts of complementary raki.  

Or you may end of sharing a table with some of the ex-pat residents like the two Americans we met whose easily-overheard conversation to their insurance broker alerted us to the joys of Symi home ownership.  Visiting them later, their house stacked Symi-style on a jagged piece of stone helped us to understand their hyper-awareness in regards to earthquakes. You had to love their main living space – his and hers desks on either side of the front picture window that takes in the entrance to the harbour and every delivery and mad dash to the ferry.  In other words, as vibrant a view as it gets on a Greek island.

Yialos Harbour

At the end of our 12-hour day on Symi, we join the throngs waiting for the ferry, and watch agog as trucks and scooters and buses jockey into position on the narrow harbour road, a tire width from falling into the sea.  The glorious confusion of vehicles with no place to move or park but still managing to negogiate a place ‘in line’ with the assistance of fourteen volunteer traffic police is Greek street democracy in action. The dance continues as the ferry disgorges its disembarking vehicles; never a straight off-load, on-load procedure, rather every vehicle off allows one vehicle on, in that order.  Controlled pandemonium (what Henry Miller refered to as ‘the epitome of flawless anarchy’) and another example of perfectly understood Greek logic.  Stand and marvel. And vow to return for Symi’s charms are not exhausted in a day.

 

HALKI

    Halki has you before you even step onto its shores.  Gliding into a harbour festooned with colourful fishing boats and a dazzling wash of terracotta, bright green and purple coloured buildings against stinging blue skies will insist upon a closer look.  Like the islands of Symi

 

and Kastellorizo, the eyecandy is a gift of the once occupying Venetians who had had a penchant for regal, multi-storied, multi-hued ‘mansions’.  Each mansion sports a bric-a-brac of terraces and shutters and doorways and passageways all vying for a view and access to the sea.  The clock tower and belfry of Agios Nikolaos church easily command the most panoramic views.

Emborio

    Upon landing, uppermost on your list of things to do will be exploring the town and ferreting out the most whimsical of the white balustraded harbour-side homes.  A path wanders along the water, zig-zagging between the Venetian beauties, each one begging you to examine its chic design, iron work, or colour scheme a bit more closely.   Good chance you will disturb someone hovering over a manuscript when you do – Halki is clearly on the radar for people who like  quiet retreats by celeste seas (with springs refreshing the harbour water each year, the colour, clarity and swimmability of the water is second to none). Our own hastily booked place doesn’t disappoint, hidden behind the church tower, Villa Dolphin’s balcony juts like an infinity pool into the harbour just below.

Ancient Village of Horio

    Visiting an ancient and now mostly deserted town – Horio – situated eight kilometres inland and up a mountainside, will likely be the next on your to-do list.  The road winds by a seaside cemetery, by the town’s main playa, the brick-lumber yards of the town (fiercely guarded by questionable-looking mutts), to the dry mesa of the island.  Horio emerges – perfectly camouflaged on the flank of an inland-facing hill (protecting it from pirates).  A Hospitaller castle guards the town from 1000 metres up, clearly the first line of defense against marauders from the sea.  Beyond Horio, small settlements, dating back to the 4th century BC, dot the island, and a monastery – Agios Ioanni – gleams from an aerie above us, urging the occasional pilgrim we meet on the road onwards.

Harbour Life

    You will have no trouble finding places to eat or drink away the day on Halki, as one café after another line the bijoux harbour.  The

scale is small and understated with evening entertainment supplied by the Anek ferry when it arrives at nightfall, swallowing the harbour view and adding another hundred lights to a already incandescent nightscape.

    Interestingly, should you board the ferry, it will take you not only to neighbouring Karpathos and onwards to Crete, but also northwards to Santorini.  Hence, a stop in Halki, where you can easily spend two nights dipping into local cafes and gorging on the views, is perfectly positioned as a ‘stop, breathe the frangipiani and go’ interlude on your way to still more beguiling islands.

 

KARPATHOS

    Karpathos is an island strewn along the southeastern edge of Greece, distinctly partitioned off into two sections: North and South

Karpathos.  We got ‘stranded’ on the northern shores, and that, it turned out, was a good thing as that is the section that is crowned with Olympos – the town resolutely trapped in the past.

Diafini

    We landed in Diafini, the seaside ferry port in North Karpathos, in early May which meant that public road transportation – buses – had not stirred yet from their winter hibernation.  We had the option of hiring a private drive (expensive, and boringly bourgeoise), or making the most of foot travel.  Given our well-seasoned feet (via three Caminos and trails on Tilos), we chose the latter and four days exploration later, we were glad we had.

    Diafini is the seaside adjunct to Olympos; the terminus which puts people down from the mountain on the boat to Crete, Rhodes or Athens. We stationed ourselves in a lovely harbour-side pension, the Maistrali, run by a

Greek family that had just returned from years living in New York to reclaim their ancestral properties.  Our room was spectacular – all traditional blue and white with gossamer curtains that billowed in the sea breeze and a balcony that had a bird’s eye view of the town.  At this time of year, that meant overlooking a steady stream of trucks and brightly vested workers cleaning the harbour of the silt that had flooded the town during spring run-off.

    The owners of Maistrali, Anna and Stelios, had a Greek cook who had been an executive chef in Toronto, now happy to retreat to a slower lifestyle and time to experiment with tourist-friendly dishes.  The meals, beginning with exquisitely plated breakfasts, were an epicurean delight.  Occasionally they were accompanied by a visit from Roger – the local expat Brit, who, between giving English classes, helping with harbour clean-up and vetting Amalia’s culinary explorations, wrote books about his 25 years immersed in the culture and life of these islanders. Tales from a Greek Island and More Tales from a Greek Island recount his experiences as an honourable member of Karpathian society, assisting as an apiarist, fisherman, anthropologist, naturalist (helping out in the bird count

of endangered species, for one), gives the reader a front row seat to the theatre that is traditional Greek life.  He writes with tremendous affection and respect for the people he has come to know on Karpathos, rejoicing with them, grieving with them, empathizing with their struggles in integrating the new ways with the old.  Migration overseas – largely to Baltimore, US – has affected every family on Northern Karpathos, with many, like Anna and Stelios, retiring to their childhood homes to banish the homesickness that has likely haunted them all of their lives.

Olympos

    Even without a command of the local language – as Roger had – we could see what called this writer back every

year.  Trails along the sea – by sweeps of olive plantations that hug the rocky escarpment, high pastoral farm lands of Avlona accessed by a rigorous climb from the sea, to the improbable Olympos dangling from a hilltop a mile

above the sea – all confirmed a local population as tough as the land they had chosen to dwell upon.  Staggering views from Olympos (Santorini without the cruise crowds/Positano-Not-by-the-Sea) took in the old silos that had stored the townspeople’s grains and legumes for the winter and had kept them self-sufficient for so many years.  

Encounters with the women – all of whom were dressed in traditional black robes and colourfully braided aprons and scarves – are delightfully frequent, and unabashedly photographed.  One of them, garrulous Riga, parades me though her shop and lines up a dozen scarves for me to try on.  Once she has determined that I am unmarried and hence need not be restricted to black everything, she urges

me to take the soft blue one with the silver, bellydance bangles.  To her, the shop is a diversion to the real work that awaits each year in the ‘winter pasture by the sea’, where 700 olive trees await harvesting each fall.  Equally friendly are the restaurant owners, one of whom, while we were eating his complimentary saganaki, brought out his Karpathian-made lyra to serenade us while we ate.  And when Nikos wasn’t singing plaintive Karpathian songs, he was rolling out another story about his 36 years spent in Baltimore making pizzas, plotting his return to the ‘serenissima’ of Greek island lifestyle.

We follow the women herding their goats back down the mountain from Olympos, waving to them as the trail widens into the streets of Diafini.  Summer pasture.  Traveller’s bliss.  Go to Karpathos, and take Roger’s advice – “The southern part is rubbish!”– and stay awhile in the North.  That’s where the stories are.