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 People say, "I'm going to the Greek Islands," as if that statement established a specific locale. In fact, it only clouds the issue. There are more than 1,400 islands in Greece, about one-fifth of the country's land area, although "only" 169 of them are officially inhabited (every book, moreover, will quote you different figures). Are "The Greek Islands" better described as vacation hot spots (Ios, Thira, Kos) or remote mountain wildernesses (on Lesvos); rural outposts (DonGssa) or urbane centers (Corfu); are the white Cycladic buildings of Mikonos Town more "typical" than the ochre neoclassical facades of Simi, the chilly Macedonian winters on Thasos less "in character" than the meltemi winds that scour the Cyclades in summer or the balmy climate of Rhodos, where the sun shines 300 days a year? All - and none of the above. When John Donne wrote of "an island, entire of itself," he might have been talking about the distinct, individual worlds that comprise the Greek Islands.
Mainland Greece is a mountainous country, and the mountains run into the sea to form the Greek Islands, most of which are formed by sedimentary rock deposits. Nisiros, Thira (Santorin) and Milos are volcanic, and eruptions and earthquakes have continued into this century. The Ionian Islands were rocked by an earthquake in 1953, and Thira in 1956.
The islands are divided into six main groups, more for administrative convenience than anything else. Along its western flank Greece abuts onto the Ionian Sea, named for the nymph lo (whom the goddess Hera turned into a cow as punishment for having attracted Zeus), and not to be confused with Ionia in Asia Minor, now Turkey. Of the Ionian Islands, Kerkira, or Corfu, is the largest and bestknown; it represents many tourists' first introduction to Greece, as it's the first stop on the ferry route from Italy to Patras. Other important Ionian islands are Kefalonia and lovely Zakinthos.
Athens is perched on the southeastern coast of the Greek mainland, just above the Peloponnese, on the Saronic Gulf. Nearest to Athens and therefore popular day-trip destinations, the Saronic Gulf Islands bear resounding names from Greek history: Salamina, where the Athenian navy beat the Persians in 480 B.C., today a rather plain suburb, or Idra and Spetses, whose ships formed the core of the Greek navy in the 1821 War of Independence. The latter two aren't really in the Saronic Gulf at all; they're tucked up against the Peloponnesian coast.
An hour north of Athens sprawls Evia, known to classicists as Euboeia, so big and so close to the mainland that people forget it's an island at all. Above it is a group of islands called the "Scattered Ones," or Sporades: popular Skiathos and Skopelos, Alonnisos and Skiros.
In the northern reaches of the Aegean, Thasos and Samothr5ki are individualists with no taste for joining a group. Limnos, however, is administratively allied with the Northeast Aegean Islands, large islands which have in common forested interiors, rocky shores, and a definite independence and character: these are Mitilini (better known to many as Lesvos), Hios, Samos and Ikaria.
South of these, the Dodecanese, or "Twelve Islands," do have a common political and historical identity. There are in fact around 16 of them, from Patmos in the north to Kasos in the south. Close to Turkey, these islands (also called the Southern Sporades) remained technically Turkish until the Italians arrived in 1914; the Dodecanese didn't become Greek until 1945. At the center of all of these, the Cyclades are the best-known and mostvisited of the Greek Islands. Most famous of this group are Naxos and Paros, Thira (Santorin) and fos; here, too, are beautiful Serifos, cool Andros, Tinos, "the Lourdes of Greece," and Amorgds. All of these "encircle" the sacred island of Dilos, supposedly the reason the "Cyclades" (deriving from the word for "circle") were so named.
Then there's the largest of the islands, Crete, so big that it deserves a book by itself. The chapter herein outlines a few highlights; anyone staying longer is referred to the Nelles Guide Crete.
Traditionally, islanders lived from shipping, fishing and cultivating what crops they could on the islands' sparse, generally poor soil. The latter has prevented the development of large-scale agriculture; the average Greek farmer has only about one hectare of land. Main island products are olives, grapes and other fruits, wine, herbs and the ubiquitous Greek honey.
The earth has been slightly more forthcoming with mineral resources, exploitation of which began on the islands when Neolithic explorers traveled to Milos for obsidian in the sixth millennium B.C. Other island minerals include marble (Naxos, Paros, Tinos), gold and silver (Sifnos), iron and copper (Serifos), and such volcanic by-products as pumice (Nisiros) and bauxite. There's also oil exploration and drilling; the Prinos Oil Field, off Thasos, has been producing since 1981.
The principal source of revenue in the island world has always been from the sea. Today, the waters of the Mediterranean are grievously overfished, forcing many fishing fleets to remain in harbor in the summer months. Fish farms have opened on some islands, providing local employment on the one hand, and lively controversies about pollution and commercial development on the other.
Shipping was long a more reliable source of wealth. Island magnates began developing shipping empires even under the Ottomans: Andros and Siros, Idra and Spetses, Hios, Skopelos and Simi all enjoyed varying degrees of prosperity throughout the 19th century. Some of this wealth has continued to the present; Hios and little mousses, for example, are known as centers for shipping tycoons. But the opening of the Corinth Canal in 1893 turned Piraeus into Greece's major port, cutting out island harbors such as Siros; and progress, such as the advent of steam and diesel power, meant that boats could travel farther without having to refuel and resupply, depriving the islands of a major traditional function.
As the Greek economy struggled to rebuild after the cruel devastation of World War II, workers went wherever they had to in order to feed their families, and large-scale emigration, especially to America and Australia, left whole island villages empty. Other island men traveled the world with the merchant marine. Today, however, the big international ships are registered in other countries and hire cheaper, non-EU labor. Many former sailors have returned home to try to profit from the islands' greatest, and steadiest, source of revenue: tourism.
Shoreline development is a relatively recent phenomenon. In past centuries, towns were built inland, where they were safer from pirates, and beaches were seen as poor land because of the impossibility of farming the sandy soil. After tourists began to arrive in the 1960s and people saw a way to bring in the money they needed so desperately, building began unchecked; careful planning was the least of their concerns. The result is a surfeit of ugly concrete blocks, from hotels to souvlaki stands. Worst is when the money runs out halfway through construction and the eyesore is left unfinished. Now, the tourist market has raised waterfront real estate prices to a point that some Greeks can't even afford to buy at all. Since the resident English, German or Scandanavian expats don't pay local taxes, their presence is something of a drain; though they do bring in foreign currency. Foreigners have also reclaimed some of the abandoned old houses. These aren't always empty as a result of emigration: tradition dictates that parents build a new house for their daughter when she marries; the old one is eventually left empty. Dowries have been outlawed since 1983, but the practice continues, nonetheless.
Although foreigners represent a large percentage of holiday-makers, plenty of Greeks take their vacations on the islands, too. Greece is one of the countries with the largest number of stay-at-home vacationers in Europe. As one Athens resident put it: "People come from all over the world to vacation in my country, and there are so many parts of it I haven't seen; why should I go somewhere else?
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