Why sail the Greek Isles
Greece has roughly two hundred inhabited islands, and the ferry network between them is a genuine vacation in its own right, but it is also a vacation spent packing, waiting and re-checking timetables. A ship does the moving overnight. You wake up in Santorini, and the following morning you are in Mykonos, and you unpacked once.
The islands are also close enough together that itineraries here have very few sea days. A seven-night Aegean sailing will often call somewhere five or six times, which is a higher port-to-sea ratio than almost anywhere else we sell.
The stops that define it
- Santorini: the caldera, and the single most photographed arrival in the Mediterranean. Ships anchor rather than dock; you reach Fira by cable car, donkey path or tender-plus-bus. Go early, and know that a rough afternoon can cancel the tender operation outright.
- Mykonos: Little Venice, the windmills, and the best walkable town in the Cyclades. Most ships dock at the new port, a shuttle ride from Chora.
- Athens (Piraeus): the Acropolis is a forty-minute drive from the pier and it is worth every minute of it. If your itinerary starts here, come a day early.
- Rhodes: a medieval walled city you enter through a gate in the ramparts, still inhabited. The best-preserved old town on any Greek island.
- Crete: big enough that the port you call at genuinely changes the day: Heraklion for Knossos, Chania for the Venetian harbor.
What to know before you book
Tender ports are a real variable. Santorini and several smaller islands are anchor-and-tender calls. In a stiff meltemi wind they get skipped. Itineraries that dock rather than tender are worth preferring if this is a once-in-a-lifetime trip.
Check whether “Greek Isles” includes Turkey. Kuşadası, for Ephesus, appears on a good number of these itineraries and is among the finest ruins in the Mediterranean. It is also a different country, and a different visa question for some passports.
Shoulder season is not a compromise here. October in the Aegean is warm, quiet and half the price of August.
