Greece - Korina Miller [498]
Limani Meston ( 22710 76389; Limenas Mesta; fish €6-12) For excellent and unique seafood dishes, try this waterfront fish taverna. The astakomakaronadha and special atherinopita (small fried fish with onions) are both recommended. Remarkably, it even does fresh breakfast-time tyropita (cheese pie) and bougatsa (creamy semolina pudding wrapped in a pastry envelope and baked) if you’re waiting for the ferry to Psara.
GETTING AROUND
Mesta is a walking-only town; excepting the regular buses to Chios town, it can be hard to see other major sites from here. Fortunately, the friendly, English-speaking Dimitris Kokkinos ( 6972543543) provides taxi services to major destinations. Sample fares from Mesta: Limenas Mesta €6; Pyrgi €11; Olympi €20; Vessa €23; Kampos €30; Chios Town €35.
Around Mesta
Mesta’s west-coast port, Limenas Mesta (also called Limenas Meston), is a pretty harbour of colourful fishing boats and tavernas, with nearby pebble beaches, the best being Avlonia Beach (7.3km west of Mesta).
Some 3km southeast of Mesta is Olympi – like Mesta and Pyrgi, a mastic-producing village characterised by its defensive architecture. Continue 5km south to the splendid Cave of Sykia (admission incl tour €4; 10am-8pm Tue-Sun), a 150-million-year-old cavern discovered accidentally in 1985. Some 57m deep, the cave’s filled with weird, multicoloured stalactites and other rock formations, shaped like giant white organs and phantasms. Selectively lit by floodlights and connected by a series of platforms with handrails, the cave is safe, though somewhat slippery. With its marvellous lighting and colours, the cave could be the set for some adventure movie: think Indiana Jones. Guided tours run every 30 minutes, the last at 7.30pm.
The good dirt road south from here passes a little-used military range, as the signs (unhelpfully, Greek-only) warn. Although there’s no danger, this is not a place for random hiking; stick to the road. After 2km the road ends at a small church overlooking Agia Dynami Beach, a curving, sandy cove where the water is a stunning combination of blues and greens, flecked with white wavelets. The beach is completely pristine and undeveloped, and you’re likely to have it to yourself.
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INOUSSES ΟΙΝΟΥΣΣΕΣ
pop 1050 / area 14 sq km
Just northwest of Chios, placid Inousses is ancestral home to about one-third of Greece’s shipping barons (the so-called arhontes), whose wealthy descendents return here annually for summer vacations from their homes in London, Paris or New York. Inousses was settled in 1750 by ship-owning families from Kardamyla in northeastern Chios, and some amassed huge fortunes during the 19th and early 20th centuries; lingering traces of this history are visible in Inousses’ grand mansions and ornate family mausoleums high above the sea.
Although Inousses is little-visited by foreign tourists, it does get a bit lively in high season, with an open-air cinema, cafes and night-time beach parties. Nevertheless, it has retained its serenity and remains an escapist destination, with only one hotel and a few rooms and villas for rent.
The island’s port and only town, also called Inousses, attests to its seafaring identity. Arriving by ferry, you’ll see a small and green sculpted mermaid watching over the harbour – the Mother of Inoussa (Mitera Inoussiotissa), protector of mariners. And, along with the port village’s white stone houses crowned by two churches, Inousses boasts a well-disciplined merchant marine academy and an eclectic museum of model ships, bequeathed by a former shipping baron. Refreshingly, the placid waterfront is lined by colourful boats where the plaintive cry of seagulls, and not domatia owners hawking rooms, greets