Skopelos

Most travellers who fly into Skiathos and take the ferry across to Skopelos come for the Mamma Mia chapel and the photograph from the top. The chapel of Agios Ioannis Kastri sits on a rock spur on the north-eastern coast, about 110 stone steps up, and is beautiful in the late afternoon. It is also a cliché. The reason to stay on Skopelos is everything else.

The interior is dense pine, with plum and almond orchards in the valleys between the central hills. Skopelos plums are small, deep purple and very sweet. Islanders dry them, bake them into spoon sweets (fruit preserved in syrup) and fold them into hilopita pasta dishes they consider their own. Skopelos cheese pies, fried in twisted spirals of phyllo, are sold from harbour kiosks first thing in the morning. The food alone is reason to come back.

The town rises in concentric tiers above its harbour, and local tradition counts more than 300 churches and chapels around it. That figure includes the smallest field-side shrines, but even so there are unusually many. The narrow lanes climbing from the harbour to the ruined Venetian kastro, or castle, hold working ceramic studios and small bakeries rather than boutiques. The 1965 earthquake spared most of the older buildings.

Glossa, in the north-west above the small port of Loutraki, is a quieter base for travellers who want to avoid Skopelos town in high summer. Its stone houses fall down a steep slope facing Skiathos across the strait. Stay at least three nights, four if you want to slow down, in late May, June or September. The ferry from Skiathos takes 45 minutes when the wind allows.

House Notes

  1. Arrival

    Fly from Athens to Skiathos, then cross to Skopelos by sea. In summer the SeaJets catamaran Eagle Jet 2 and the Aegean Flying Dolphins hydrofoil Erato run the Skiathos crossing, for passengers only, in 40 minutes to an hour. From Volos on the mainland, Hellenic Seaways calls all year, taking 3 hours 45 minutes.

  2. The address

    Adrina at Panormos Bay is three properties in the same family’s hands since 1992: Adrina Beach, Adrina Resort & Spa and the newest, Adrina Grand. The bay faces west, and the suites step down to a private cove. Repeat custom on the books stands above 85 per cent.

  3. The kitchens

    Anna’s, in a garden in the old town since 2004, draws on Greek antiquity and the wider Mediterranean, and the owner, Anna Aivazoglou, folds her Armenian heritage into the menu. Perivoli, on a cobbled lane nearby, is the orchard table, with pork with apples and plums and herbs the chef cuts that morning. Agnanti at Glossa, family-run since 1953, has the view across the strait to Skiathos and Evia.

  4. Michalis Pies

    For Skopelitiki tiropita, the island’s own spiral pie of goat’s-milk cheese deep-fried in olive oil, the address is Michalis in the cobbled alleys of the old town, open since 1991. The pie is rolled by hand at the counter and the coil set into the oil to order, with a three-minute wait.

  5. The Palouki trails

    The signposted T2 trail climbs Mount Palouki to the Holy Monastery of Taxiarches and the chapel of Agia Anna, on the working monastic ridge above town, a measured half-day walk. T1 continues to the cluster at the Palouki summit, and T5, from Loutraki up to Glossa, is the gentler choice when the south coast heats up in late summer.

  6. The Sentoukia

    On the inland ridge of Mount Karya, north of Skopelos town, four rock-cut tombs from the Roman or early Christian period sit in a porous outcrop. Three still have their 2.5-metre lids in place and the fourth was never finished; they were family graves, looted before the modern record. On a clear day the view from the spur runs to Alonissos, Evia, Skiathos and Pelion.

  7. The beaches

    Limnonari, reached on foot from Agnontas along the seafront path, has 750 metres of pale sand under a pine ridge. Milia, 15 kilometres west of town, is the longest arc of sand on the road to Glossa. Hovolo, on the western coast next to Neo Klima, is a narrow pebble cove between white cliffs, reached by a steep path at low tide.

  8. Peparithios

    Skopelos has 4,000 years of winemaking behind it, and in myth its founder Staphylos was the son of Dionysos. Phylloxera, an insect pest of vines, destroyed the vineyards a century ago, and local farmers have since brought the dark Peparithios red back to the bottle, alongside Savatiano, roditis and assyrtiko whites. The wines turn up on island lists rather than mainland ones.

  9. The Marine Park day

    Between May and October, day boats from Skopelos run out to Kyra Panagia, the largest island in the Northern Sporades marine park. Saint Athanasios of Athos bought the Monastery of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary on the summit in 993 AD for 70 gold Byzantine coins, and the climb from the cove takes 20 minutes. The Mediterranean monk seal shelters in the surrounding caves.

  10. Stafylos’s tomb

    At the cape between Stafylos and Velanio, on a rocky peninsula once home to a Mycenaean settlement, lies the tomb Nikolaos Platon excavated in 1936. The grave belonged to King Staphylos; inside lay a bronze sword 32 centimetres long with a forged-gold handle, now in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens. It is the clearest archaeological window the island has.

Anchorage Notes

  1. Skopelos Town

    Skopelos Town, also called Chora, is the main port and the commercial centre of the island, its white houses rising like an amphitheatre above the bay. It has two harbours in one: the older inner basin, and the newer quay where the ships now dock. A yacht lies below the tiers of the town, with the churches, which the island counts in hundreds, climbing the hill above the water.

  2. Loutraki

    Loutraki, the island’s second harbour, is the port of Glossa, below the hillside village on the northwest coast. Many of the ferries call here first before going on to Chora, so it is the quieter arrival, with shops and tavernas along the quay and the climb up to Glossa behind. A yacht lies here for the north of the island, away from the town’s traffic.

  3. Agnontas

    Agnontas is a small natural harbour on the south coast, 8 kilometres from the town, and fishing boats and pleasure craft are its usual trade. It is the island’s alternative port, where the ferries go when weather closes both Chora and Loutraki. A yacht lies in the cove, with the tavernas at the water’s edge and the pine ridge behind.

  4. Agios Ioannis Kastri

    On the northeast coast near Glossa, the small chapel of Agios Ioannis sto Kastro stands alone on a rock rising sheer from the sea, reached by a little over 100 steps cut into the stone. The wedding in Mamma Mia! was filmed at this church in 2008, and boats come for it from both Skopelos and Glossa. A yacht lies off the rock, and the climb is the reason to come.