An Andros itinerary: five days of walking

It trades the sugar-cube skyline for shipowner mansions, running streams and a waymarked trail network. It is the Cyclades island Athenians tend to keep for themselves, and the one most first-time planners sail straight past. Five days uses it properly. Everything else is in the Andros guide.

Before you book: Rafina, and a car

Andros leaves from Rafina on the other side of Attica, not from Piraeus, which is the detail that catches people out on the northern Cyclades. Rafina is closer to Athens airport than Piraeus is, which works in the island’s favour if you are flying in.

The greenness has a mechanism rather than a reputation. Andros is high and exposed, and its mountains catch the moisture that weather carries across the Aegean, so where flatter islands stay bone-dry the interior valleys here hold running water. That is why there are streams, springs and small waterfalls feeding terraced gardens of plane, walnut, oak and mulberry that belong more to a mainland mountain village than to a Cycladic rock.

Take a car. The trailheads are spread out and the bus will not get you to them.

Day 1: Chora, and the mansions

The capital sits on a spit of rock on the east coast, with a ruined Venetian castle on an islet at the end of it and a main street of neoclassical shipowner mansions leading down to it.

That architecture is the point. Andros made money at sea and spent it here, and the town reads as a small nineteenth-century port rather than a village. There is a good modern art museum too, which is unexpected on a Cycladic island and worth an hour.

Walk out to the castle rock at the end of the spit in the late afternoon.

Day 2: the first walk, and Pythara

Start walking on the second day rather than the fourth, because it is what the island is for. Andros has around a hundred kilometres of waymarked trail, restored and signposted, running between villages on old stone paths and across arched bridges.

Pick a short route to begin with and aim for the Pythara falls near Apikia, which are the best-known of the island’s waterfalls and a genuinely surprising thing to find in the Cyclades. In spring they run properly; in high summer they are a trickle and the walk is still shaded and pleasant.

Day 3: the villages, and the interior

Give a day to the inland villages. Menites with its spring and its plane trees, Apikia above it, Stenies with more mansions, and Messaria with its Byzantine church are the cluster to work through.

The pleasure here is the ordinary kind: a village square under a tree, a long lunch, water running somewhere nearby. It is the Greece of the mainland mountains transplanted to an island, and it is why Athenians come.

Day 4: a proper walk

By day four take one of the longer waymarked routes. The trail network links villages across the middle of the island and some routes drop to the coast, which lets you finish at a beach.

Start early, take water, and check where the route ends relative to where you left the car. This is the day people remember about Andros.

Hiking in Greece covers the wider picture, but on Andros the walking is the picture.

Day 5: the beaches

Andros has good beaches and almost nobody on them, which is unusual for a Cycladic island of this size. The east coast around Chora has the accessible ones; the north and west are wilder and need the drive.

Pick according to the wind, which matters here as everywhere in the Cyclades, and treat this as the day off rather than the point of the trip.

How to adapt this

Three days. Chora, one short walk to Pythara, and one longer trail. That is the essential Andros.

Without a car. Difficult. Buses link the main settlements but the trailheads and the inland villages need wheels.

In spring. The best season by a distance: the streams run, the falls work, the island is green and the walking is at its best. The swimming is not yet worth it, which is a fair trade.

Adding Tinos. Just off the southern tip and a natural pair, quiet in a different way. Andros vs Tinos works through the choice.

Where this leaves you

Five days on Andros: the Chora and its mansions on the first, a short walk to the Pythara falls on the second, the inland villages on the third, a long waymarked trail on the fourth, and the beaches on the fifth. Leave from Rafina, take a car, and come in spring if the walking is the reason you are going.

Quick answers

How many days do you need on Andros?

Five if you are walking, three if you are not. The island is large, green and spread out, and its trail network is the main reason to come, so a trip that never leaves the coast misses the point of it.

Why is Andros so much greener than other Cyclades islands?

It is high and exposed, so its mountains catch the moisture carried across the Aegean. Where flatter islands stay dry, the interior valleys here hold running water, with streams, springs and small waterfalls feeding terraced gardens of plane, walnut and mulberry.

Does Andros leave from Piraeus?

No, from Rafina on the other side of Attica. That is the detail most often missed on the northern Cyclades routes, and it also means Rafina is closer to Athens airport than Piraeus, which is convenient if you are flying in.

Is Andros good for walking?

It is one of the best walking islands in Greece, with around a hundred kilometres of restored and waymarked trail running between villages on old stone paths and arched bridges. Spring is the season for it.