The Sporades
Four islands off the coast of Pelion, forested to the shore, with a national marine park and beaches shaded by umbrella pines — a rarity in Greece.
Koukounaries, Skiathos 
Skopelos - Image slotThe marine park by boat — Sporades. Uninhabited islets, a Byzantine monastery on Kyra Panagia, and a real chance of monk seals.
- Image slotWalking Skopelos — Sporades. Old mule paths between monasteries and plum orchards, in pine shade.
- Image slotSkyros carnival — Sporades. Goat-bell dancers and masked figures in late February — one of the oldest surviving rites in Europe.
The character of the place
Skiathos has the beaches, Koukounaries above all, and the busiest airport. Skopelos is greener and quieter, with a harbour town of slate roofs stacked up a hillside and a hundred and twenty churches.
Alonnisos sits inside the National Marine Park of the Northern Sporades, the largest protected sea area in Europe and home to a Mediterranean monk seal population. The diving and the boat days here are genuinely different from anywhere else in the country.
Skyros is separate in every sense — larger, drier, further east, with a Byzantine monastery, its own pony breed, and a carnival in February that predates Christianity.
Worth the day
The marine park by boat
Uninhabited islets, a Byzantine monastery on Kyra Panagia, and a real chance of monk seals.
Walking Skopelos
Old mule paths between monasteries and plum orchards, in pine shade.
Skyros carnival
Goat-bell dancers and masked figures in late February — one of the oldest surviving rites in Europe.
Where to base yourself
Skopelos Town
Slate and whitewash rising from the harbour; a working town rather than a resort.
Patitiri or Old Alonnisos
The port, or the restored hilltop village above it, with the marine park on the doorstep.
What to skip
August on Skiathos, when the airport and the beaches both run at capacity.
Three ways this region is travelled
Worked examples, not products. Each opens day by day, with the route drawn on a map.
6 days · May – October
Skopelos and the marine park
- Skopelos Town
- Old Alonnisos
- the marine park islets
A slate-roofed harbour town, a restored hilltop village, and Europe's largest protected sea.
7 days · May – June, September – October
Skiathos, a shaded week
- Skiathos Town
- Koukounaries
- Skopelos Town
Pine forest running to the waterline and beaches shaded enough to sit out an afternoon.
5 days · May – October
Skyros, apart from the rest
- Skyros Town
- Atsitsa
- Kalamitsa
A larger, drier island with its own pony breed and a Byzantine monastery above the town.
Pairs well with
- Pelion & Magnesia
The ferries leave from Volos — mountain and forest, then the islands they look out at.