Anafi travel guide

Anafi is an island you can literally walk around in a single day if you have the mind and courage to do so. Good boots a stout walking stick and a head for heights in some places are necessary. There are trails that total some 18km and crisscross the island. Everything is accessible by foot although scooters are available for hire if walking is not your thing, of course cross country contact is more limited by scooter than it is by foot but the opportunity to see much is also there. Climbing is also an activity that offers itself at the rock of Kalamo which is some 460 meters high and the view from the top is fan-tastic! There is also a path that will take you to the top if you are not that active, but it is a strenuous climb that will last the better part of one and a half hours. At the top of the rock you will find the church of Panagia tis Kalamiotissas which means virgin of the reeds, apparently an icon of the Virgin Mary was found behind some reeds at that location (a mystery to ponder on since the rock is barren) and is usually closed, but then the view is what you want. The structure is built on the site an older church which was St. Nicholas dated back to 1715.

Kastelli is another place worth visiting because of the numerous Roman era ruins although the site is quite a bit more ancient that the roman period ruins suggest because the foundations of ancient city walls of the older Hellenic periods can still be seen.

The Monastery of Zoodochou pigis (life giving source or spring) is a site one can visit for a taste of old and new since it is also the site of the ancient temple. This is the “new” monastery built on the isthmus. There are chapels galore of all sizes, dotting the landscape as there are on every Greek island.

If climbing is your thing, another strenuous climb will lead you to the Venetian citadel which is no more but offers another stunning view. All the Cycladic islands Anafi included, submitted to the control of Frankish warlords after AD 1207. the Namely the Foscoli, the Gozzadini, the Crispi and the Posani successively. It was William Crispi, who was later named Duke of Naxos, who built the fortress in the 15th century. There is very little left of it now to see of the extensive and once massive walls. In 1537 Anafi fell to the corsair Barbarossa a Turk. Under the Turks things were calm and in general the locals were left alone so long as they paid their annual tribute to the Kapitan Pasha on Paros. In 1770-75 The Russians occupied the island during the time an revolution that Prince Orloff fomented which turned out to be abortive, during which period it is said many antiquities were stolen and spirited off to St. Petersburg (another practice the colonialist powers of the time seemed to have perpetrated everywhere there was something of value to steal). After the departure of the Russians, the Turks regained control until the 1821 Greek War of Independence.