Things to do in Poros

Poros is separated from the Peloponnese by a channel only a few hundred metres wide, and small boats cross it constantly. From the waterfront you look at the mainland the way you would look across a river. That closeness is the character of the place: an island, but a domesticated one, and among the easiest to reach from Athens.

Poros Town and the clocktower. The town rises in tiers of neoclassical and pastel houses on a small conical hill, topped by a blue-domed clocktower that is the island’s emblem. The waterfront runs along the channel and is busy with the traffic of the crossing, which is a genuinely different kind of harbour: what passes in front of you is not tourism, it is people going to and from the mainland. The climb up through the lanes and steps to the clock is a pleasant hour, and the view from the top takes in the channel, the mainland and the pine ridge behind.

The two halves, which is the thing to understand. Poros is really two islands joined: Sferia, the small rocky one carrying the town, and Kalavria, the larger wooded one behind it. Almost everyone photographs Sferia and almost nobody walks into Kalavria, which is where the space actually is.

Kalavria, the wooded half. Pine forest, quiet bays at Askeli and Neorio, and the monastery of Zoodochos Pigi standing in the trees. It is the antidote to the busy waterfront, and it is a short move rather than an expedition.

The Temple of Poseidon, and the story attached to it. On the high ground of Kalavria are the ruins of a sanctuary where the orator Demosthenes is said to have taken poison rather than be captured. Little of the temple stands, and it is worth saying that plainly before you walk up: you are going for the site and the walk rather than for architecture. Both are good. A sanctuary on high ground with the Saronic laid out around it explains its own position better than any surviving column would.

The lemon forest, which is on the mainland. Across the channel is the Lemonodasos, a hillside planted with thousands of lemon trees, with a stream and a watermill. Boats cross to it from the town, and the walk up through the grove is the classic Poros half day. In blossom it is the reason people write about this place. It is also a neat illustration of the island’s character: the best-known excursion here is not on the island at all.

How it fits a trip. Two nights, and it works well as a first stop in a Saronic chain with Hydra and Spetses. Ferries and fast boats run from Piraeus, or you can take the very short crossing from Galatas on the Peloponnese, which makes Poros unusually easy to combine with a mainland drive. Our Poros guide has the island, the beaches cover the water, and the group is the Saronic islands.