Myrina & the west

Myrina is the kind of port town that justifies a week on its own: a Byzantine and Genoese castle on a headland splitting the town into two beaches, neoclassical houses along Romeikos Gialos, a fishing harbour on the other side, and a bazaar street of stone shops between them. Fallow deer live inside the castle walls and come out at dusk, which makes the twenty-minute climb a fixed item on everyone's first evening. Below the walls, the Archaeological Museum holds the finds from the island's four excavated ancient sites.

The south-west coast has the easy beaches: Platy and Thanos are broad crescents of sand with tavernas and sunbeds, Riha Nera in town is shallow enough for toddlers, and Evgatis a little further south is the one islanders name first. Above Thanos, the chapel of Panagia Kakaviotissa sits in the mouth of a cave with no roof of its own.

This is also where you eat. Look for kalathaki Limnou, the PDO sheep and goat cheese sold in its little basket, melipasto, and flomari, the thick local pasta. O Platanos and Riza in Myrina are the reliable tables.