Route B
One week starting and ending in Athens.
- Alimos
- Kythnos Mericha
- Syros Ermoupolis
- Mykonos Delos
- Kea
- Sounion
- Alimos
Suggested islands
Mykonos and Delos
Μύκονος was once one of the most important trading centres in the western Aegean. Its arid and only moderately fertile soil permits only a modest development of agriculture, but its beautiful beaches have made it one of the most popular holiday islands in the Aegean. Indeed, the new marina port is growing in popularity and is actually becoming a small charter base from which you can hire charter yachts to start your sailing holiday. Moreover, it has a flourishing craft industry and Mykonos is also the starting point from which to visit the neighbouring island of Delos.
Δήλος, is likewise a rocky island and lies 5 nm south-west of Mykonos and it is one of the smallest of the Cyclades. Yet, Apollo was born on Delos and the island was therefore of great importance in antiquity. Indeed, the Cyclades were so called because they were seen as lying in a circle (kyklos) round this sacred island.
Paros and Antiparos
Πάρος, lying some 8 km west of Naxos, is occupied by a range of hills of gently rounded contours, rising to 764 m in Mount Profitis Ilias (rewarding climb, with guide; magnificent panoramic views). Three bays cut deep inland – in the west the sheltered Paroikia Bay, with the island’s capital that serves as the main sailing port and as a yacht charter base; in the north the bay which shelters the little town of Naoussa, which in Roman times was the island’s main port for the shipment of Lychnites marble; and in the east the flat Marmara bay. The whole island is covered with a layer of coarse-grained crystalline limestone, in which lie rich beds of pure marble.
The island’s considerable prosperity has depended since ancient times on agriculture, favoured by fertile soil and an abundance of water, and on the working on marble, which is still quarried on a small scale. In recent years the rapid development of the tourist trade has brought changes in the landscape, the island’s economy and its social structure.