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CITY GUIDE / 39 discovery ideas
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Midilli (Lesvos).
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Search this city by topic →Climb the stone lanes of Molyvos to its castle
Grey stone houses stack up the hill under a Genoese castle, and the market lane is roofed by wisteria the whole way. Climb to the walls — and photograph it.
Walk the three empires inside Mytilene Castle
Byzantine foundations, Genoese walls and Ottoman gates stand in the same pine-covered fortress above the town, one of the largest in the Mediterranean — and photograph it.
Cross from Ayvalık to Mytilene by ferry
Lesvos sits so close to the Turkish coast that the crossing takes barely more than an hour, and the two shores stay in sight of each other the whole way. Ride it — and photograph it.
Climb the 114 steps to the church on the rock
At Petra a single volcanic boulder rises out of the village, and a whitewashed chapel sits on top of it. Climb the cut stairway to the terrace — and photograph it.
Find a woodcarver's workshop in Agiasos
This mountain village on the slopes of Lesvos' Olympus still works wood and clay by hand behind narrow arched lanes. Find an open workshop — and photograph it.
Walk the full length of Vatera beach
Vatera runs for kilometres in an almost unbroken line of grey sand, empty at either end even in August. Walk until the crowd is gone — and photograph it.
Soak in the domed hot spring at the sea's edge
At Eftalou a stone bathhouse sits right on the shingle, and the water comes out of the ground hot enough to steam. Bathe with the Aegean a step away — and photograph it.
Watch the sunset from Sappho's beach
The poet Sappho was born at Eressos, and the long dark-sand bay below the village still faces the same western horizon she did. Stay for the sunset — and photograph it.
Count flamingos on the Kalloni salt pans
The salt pans on this shallow gulf are one of Europe's great bird crossroads, and in migration season the shallows turn pink with flamingos. Watch from the track — and photograph them.
Stand under the dome of Agios Therapon
The great domed church rises straight off the Mytilene waterfront, and its painted interior opens up the moment you step out of the harbour noise. Go in — and photograph it.
Eat the salted sardines of Kalloni gulf
The shallow warm gulf fattens a sardine the Greeks queue for, cured lightly and eaten raw with oil and lemon. Order a plate at the gulf shore — and photograph it.
See the icon said to be made of earth and blood
The Taxiarchis of Mantamados is a rare relief icon, and the tradition is that a surviving monk moulded it from soil mixed with the blood of the murdered. Stand before it — and photograph the shrine.
Find the mermaid chapel on the rocks at Skala Sikamineas
A tiny fishing harbour with a single chapel built out on the rock at the entrance, watching boats in and out. Sit at the quay tables — and photograph it.
See Picasso and Chagall in an olive grove museum
The publisher Teriade brought his collection home to his village outside Mytilene: Picasso, Chagall, Matisse, Miró and Léger, hung among olive trees. Visit it — and photograph it.
Reach Ypsilou monastery on its volcanic peak
The road west runs out of trees and turns to bare rock, and the monastery sits alone on the summit above that lunar ground. Stand at its gate — and photograph it.
Walk under the Roman aqueduct arches at Moria
A long row of grey stone arches still strides across the valley, part of an aqueduct that carried water to Mytilene from the mountains. Stand beneath a span — and photograph it.
Meet Theophilos, the painter who paid in murals
A wandering folk painter in a fustanella, Theophilos covered tavern walls across the island in exchange for meals. His museum gathers what survived — go and photograph it.
See the Petrified Forest on Lesbos
Walk the geopark of giant tree trunks turned to stone by volcanic ash twenty million years ago, still standing where they grew — and photograph it.
Test the water at the Polichnitos hot springs
These are among the hottest springs in Europe, arriving so hot that the bath house has to cool them before anyone gets in. Feel the difference at the source — and photograph it.
Try ladotyri, the cheese matured in olive oil
Lesvos makes a hard sheep's cheese aged submerged in its own olive oil — protected, made nowhere else, and sold in rounds still slick from the jar. Taste it — and photograph it.
Start the olive press that once ran the island
Lesvos lives on olive oil, and this restored communal factory still has its steam engine, stone rollers and presses in place. Follow the oil from fruit to jar — and photograph it.
Swim the little cove at Agios Ermogenis
Twenty minutes from the town there is a small white chapel over a clear rock cove that the people of Mytilene keep for themselves. Swim there — and photograph it.
Walk the cells and museum of Limonos monastery
One of the island''s great monasteries, founded in the 16th century, with courtyards of cells and a museum of manuscripts and silver. Note that the main church admits men only. Visit — and photograph it.
Circle the Ottoman castle guarding Sigri bay
A compact square fort sits right on the harbour of the island''s westernmost village, built to watch the bay and its island. Walk its seaward wall — and photograph it.
Watch a Mantamados potter throw a jar
The village has turned clay for generations, and the workshops along the road still throw the fat local water jars by hand. Watch one come off the wheel — and photograph it.
Eat with your feet in the sand at Melinda
A short strip of south-coast sand at the mouth of a green gorge, with tavernas that put their tables where the stream meets the sea. Take one — and photograph it.
Sail through the needle mouth of the Gulf of Gera
This inland sea is almost completely closed, joined to the Aegean by a channel so narrow that the olive slopes seem to meet overhead. Cross the mouth — and photograph it.
Find Panagia Krifti, the hidden spring in a sea cave
Below Melinda a thermal spring runs into a rock cave at the waterline, with a tiny chapel wedged beside it. Come by boat or the steep goat path, and bathe where the hot water meets the sea — then photograph it.
Hike up Lepetymnos from Vafios
The old path climbs out of the village through terraces and oak scrub to the northern summit ridge, where on a clear day the Turkish coast lines up behind you. Reach the top — and photograph it.
Sleep out under the stars at Faneromeni beach
The far west coast keeps one long empty bay with no road lights and no village behind it, and the night sky there is the darkest on the island. Watch it come out — and photograph it.
Gather chestnuts in the Agiasos forest
Above the village the slopes turn to sweet chestnut, and in late autumn the whole forest floor is covered in split husks. Fill a pocket — and photograph it.
Find the 16th-century frescoes at Perivolis
A small monastery hidden in a river-valley orchard keeps some of the island''s best wall paintings, including a whale swallowing Jonah. Ask to be let in — and photograph it.
Stand on the red sand at Tsonia
The volcanic rock of the northeast breaks down into a beach that is genuinely rust-red, unlike anything else on the island. Take a handful — and photograph it.
Track the nuthatch birders come to Lesvos for
The pine forest at Achladeri is the reliable European place to find Krüper''s nuthatch, and birders plan whole trips around it. Wait by the pines until one works down a trunk — and photograph it.
Read a page in the writer''s village of Sykaminea
Stratis Myrivilis was born in this hillside village above the fishing harbour, and the square under the plane tree is the one his books keep returning to. Sit there — and photograph it.
Take the empty southwest coast at Tavari
The road down the southwest corner ends at small pebble coves that most visitors never drive to, with one taverna and nothing else. Claim a cove — and photograph it.
Find the old stone bridge in the Napi valley
A single high arch of dressed stone crosses a stream far from any village, left from when mule trains carried oil across the island. Walk onto it — and photograph it.
Stand in the sanctuary of Aphrodite at Mesa
In a field near the head of the gulf lie the foundations and drums of an Ionic temple that served the whole island in antiquity. Walk the stones — and photograph them.
Meet the prehistoric animals dug up at Vrisa
The clay hills behind Vatera held the bones of horses, deer and elephants from a Lesvos with no sea around it, and the village keeps the finds. See them — and photograph it.
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