The Rough Guide to The Greek Islands - Softcover

It would take a lifetime of island-hopping to really get to know the more than 160 permanently inhabited Greek islands, let alone the countless smaller gull-roosts which dot the Aegean and Ionian seas. At the right time of year or day, they conform remarkably well to their fantastic travel-poster image; any tourist board would give its eye-teeth for the commonplace vision of purple-shadowed island silhouettes floating on a cobalt-and-rose horizon.

Closer to hand, island beaches come in all shapes, sizes and consistencies, from discrete crescents framed by tree-fringed cliffs straight out of a Japanese screen painting, to deserted, mile-long gifts deposited by small streams, where you could imagine enacting Crusoe scenarios among the dunes. But inland there is always civilization, whether the tiny cubist villages of the remoter outposts or burgeoning resorts as cosmopolitan – and brazen – as any in the Mediterranean.

What amazes most first-time visitors is the islands’ relative lack of pollution. If you’re used to the murky waters of the open Mediterranean as sampled in Spain, Israel or southern France, the Aegean will come as a revelation, with forty-foot visibility the norm, and all manner of sea creatures visible, from starfish and octopuses on the bottom to vast schools of fish.

The sea is also a watersports paradise: the joys of snorkelling and kayaking are on offer to novices, and some of the best windsurfing areas in the world beckon. Yacht charter, whether bare-boat or skippered, is big business, particularly out of Rhodes, Kálymnos, Lefkádha, Póros and Pireás; indeed, the Greek islands are rated on a par with the Caribbean for quality sailing itineraries. And during the months when the sea is too cold or the weather too blustery, many islands – not necessarily the largest ones – offer superb hiking on surviving mule-trails between hill villages, or up the highest summits.

Although more protected than the Greek mainland from invasions, the various archipelagos have been subject to a staggering variety of foreign influences. Romans, Arabs, Byzantines, crusading Knights of Saint John, Genoese, Venetians, French, English, Italians and Ottomans have all controlled different islands since the time of Alexander the Great. The high tide of empire has left behind countless monuments: frescoed Byzantine churches and monasteries, the fortified Venetian towns of the Cyclades and the Ionians, the more conventional castles of the Genoese and Knights in the northeast Aegean and Dodecanese, Ottoman bridges and mosques, and the Art Deco or mock-Renaissance edifices of the Italian Fascist administration.

Constructions from many of these eras are often juxtaposed with – or even superimposed on – the cities and temples of ancient Greece, which provide the foundation in all senses for claims of an enduring Hellenic cultural identity down the centuries; museums, particularly on Crete, Rhodes, Sámos, Híos, Lésvos and Límnos, amply document the archeological evidence. But it was medieval Greek peasants, fishermen and shepherds, working without an indigenous ruling class or formal Renaissance to impose models of taste or patronize the arts, who most tangibly contributed to our idea of Greekness with their songs and dances, costumes, weaving and vernacular architecture. Much of this has vanished in recent decades, replaced by an avalanche of bouzoúki-instrumental cassettes, "genuine museum copies" and tacky souvenir shops, but enough remains in isolated pockets for visitors to marvel at Greek popular culture’s combination of form and function.

Of course, most Greek-island visits are devoted to more hedonistic pursuits: going lightly dressed, swimming in balmy waters at dusk, talking and drinking under the stars until 3am. Such pleasures amply compensate for certain enduring weaknesses in the Greek tourism "product": don’t go expecting orthopedic mattresses, state-of-the-art plumbing, Cordon-Bleu cuisine or attentive service. Except at a limited number of upmarket facilities in new or restored buildings, hotel and pension rooms can be box-like, campsites tend to be of the rough-and-ready sort, and the food at its best is fresh and simply presented.