Poros
Poros sits a few hundred metres from the Peloponnese mainland — close enough that the small water-taxi crossing from the harbour to Galatas takes about four minutes, and conversations carry across the strait on a still evening. That proximity is the practical reason to choose Poros over Hydra or Spetses. From the island you can be in the lemon groves opposite for breakfast, at the ancient theatre of Epidaurus by mid-morning, and back swimming in a small Aegean cove by lunch.
The Sanctuary of Poseidon, in a saddle of pine and olive near the centre of the island, is the older anchor. In 322 BC the Athenian orator Demosthenes took refuge here and, when Macedonian soldiers came for him, took his own life inside the temple. The ruins are quiet, sparsely visited, and reached on a half-hour walk from the road. Bring water; the site has none.
In 1939, Henry Miller spent a few days on Poros and wrote about the strait and the harbour town in The Colossus of Maroussi with an enthusiasm bordering on the rapturous. Read the relevant pages on the ferry from Piraeus. The clock tower on the hill above the harbour, lit in the evening, is the orientation point for the town below. The strait itself is the architectural feature: a narrow channel of glassy water with sailing yachts moored end to end through the summer.
Poros earns two nights inside a wider Saronic itinerary, more if you intend to use the mainland as a day-trip base. The lemon groves at Lemonodasos, just across the water, are the right walk on a hot afternoon. There is a small taverna at the top, and the descent is gentle.
House Notes
Arrival
Helicopter from Athens to Poros, around 25 minutes; AegeanVIP and iFly Air Charters operate the transfer. Hellenic Seaways Flying Dolphins run from Piraeus, around an hour. Yacht arrivals berth on the town quay; the strait holds the seasonal moorings.
The address
Sirene Blue Luxury Beach Resort, 3.5 kilometres from the port in the Monastiri region, sits on a green cliff above Monastiri Bay. 90 rooms, all with sea views; a private beach with a seafront taverna; a Roof Garden Bar Restaurant, a tennis court, and two pools.
Russian Bay
Russian Bay, on the northeastern coast at Vagionia, was the Russian Naval Fleet’s Aegean station from the 18th century through 1900 — set up when Russia entered the war on Greece’s side against the Turks. Classified as a historical monument since 1989. A deep, protected cove of pine and the rust of old works.
The Naval Training Center
The Hellenic Naval Cadets Academy was founded in 1845 aboard the corvette Loudevikos, anchored at Poros. The 1884 French naval mission moved it ashore; the Academy proper relocated to Piraeus in 1905, but Poros still holds the Training Center for the junior volunteer personnel and reservists of the Hellenic Navy.
Askeli
Askeli, on the southeast side of Kalavria 2 kilometres from the town, is the most worked beach on the island — fully organised with a water-sports school, diving, deck chairs by Hotel New Aegli, Café Panorama, and the seafront restaurants. The hourly bus from town stops at the sand.
The kitchen
Aspros Gatos — the White Cat — has been a family taverna out over the water 400 metres west of the bridge since 1909. Lobster with pasta is the house dish; ouzo with grilled octopus, squid, the platters of fresh fish. The view runs across the strait to the lit harbour.
The Archaeological Museum
The Archaeological Museum of Poros, founded in 1960 in Koryzi Square, stands on the plot where Prime Minister Alexandros Koryzis’s residence once was. Findings from the temple of Poseidon at Vagionia, sculptures and inscriptions from ancient Troezen, Hellenistic figurines from Methana, and bronze vessels from Ermioni.
The sailing school
Greek Sails has run flotilla and bareboat charters from a private quay in Poros for more than thirty years; the Athens Sailing Academy, the oldest ASA-certified school in Europe, operates here through the summer on a fleet of Jeanneau yachts. The strait is the textbook classroom — steady, predictable, sheltered from the meltemi.
Lemonodasos
Across the strait at Galatas, the Lemon Forest runs uphill from the shore — some 25,000 lemon and orange trees on the Peloponnese bank, cut by stone irrigation conduits and the dry beds of old watermills. Poros once shipped its lemons to Constantinople and Smyrna. Kosmas Politis set his 1930 novella Lemonodasos among these terraces; the walk up through them, olive and pomegranate among the citrus, is the right thing for a hot afternoon.
Zoodochos Pigi
The Monastery of Zoodochos Pigi, 4 kilometres above the town on a pine slope, was founded in 1720 by the Archbishop of Athens Iakovos the Second after a cure at the island’s only spring. The 17th-century wood-carved iconostasis from Cappadocia is the architectural prize. A footnote of the Greek Revolution: Miaoulis and Tompazis took strength from it.