Paros.

Paros spent a decade becoming the Cyclades' fashionable middle child, the island people chose once Mykonos priced them out and Santorini filled up, and it wears the attention unevenly. The crowd that comes for the Naoussa bars and the beach clubs gets exactly that, and thinks it has seen the island. It has not. Paros still rewards the ones who leave the harbour, who climb to the marble villages inland, walk the Byzantine road on foot, find the quiet coves in the north and the windsurf coast in the south, and eat in the tavernas a street back from the water. This is that plan, set down plainly: the Church of a Hundred Doors, the Kastro built from a temple, the ancient quarries that gave the world its whitest marble, the wine the island alone kept alive, and the practical things, the ferries, the wind, the ride, that nobody tells you until it is too late. Twenty-five entries, each one chosen because it earns the detour, and at the end, the traps to skip. All of it free to read.

01

Time it

Parikia, the port most people walk straight past

Parikia is the island's capital and main port, and because it is where the ferries land, most visitors treat it as a bus stop on the way to Naoussa and never come back. That is their loss. Behind the tavernas and the ticket agencies of the waterfront lies a proper Cycladic old town, a whitewashed maze of marble lanes, arched passages and small churches that empties the moment you leave the harbour front. See it out of the ferry rush, early in the morning or in the evening once the day's arrivals have scattered, and walk inland until the shops thin and the town goes quiet. The old town is small enough to lose yourself in for an hour and find your way out again, and it holds the island's two great monuments, the Church of a Hundred Doors and the Venetian Kastro, a few minutes apart.

The move  Give Parikia an evening rather than a glance from the ferry ramp. Walk inland off the waterfront into the marble lanes, and pair it with the Ekatontapyliani church and the Kastro, both a short walk from the port.

Map  Parikia old town

02

See

The Church of a Hundred Doors, and the door that stays hidden

A few minutes back from the Parikia waterfront stands the Panagia Ekatontapyliani, the Church of a Hundred Doors, one of the best-preserved early Christian churches in the whole of Greece, with roots in the fourth century and a form settled under Justinian in the sixth. It is not one building but a complex: a great cruciform church, flanking chapels, and to one side a baptistery with a cross-shaped font, some of the oldest in the Orthodox world. The name is a riddle. Legend counts ninety-nine doors that can be found and a hundredth that stays hidden, and holds that the last will reveal itself only when Constantinople and its own great church are Greek again. Go in quietly, in the cool of the morning, and give the courtyard and the baptistery as much time as the nave.

The move  Visit the Ekatontapyliani early, dress to enter a working church with shoulders and knees covered, and walk the whole complex, the flanking chapels and the ancient baptistery, not just the main nave.

Map  Panagia Ekatontapyliani

03

See

The Kastro built out of a temple

On the low rise above Parikia's harbour, the Venetians raised a castle in the thirteenth century, and they built it out of whatever was to hand, which on Paros meant an ancient temple of Athena that had stood on the same hill. Walk up into the old Kastro quarter and you find the result fused into a single wall: fat marble column drums stacked on their sides like coins, slabs of Doric entablature, blocks of Archaic masonry, all mortared together into a Venetian tower. It is one of the clearest things you will ever see of how the Aegean built its present out of its past, the classical world quarried for stone by the medieval one. It costs nothing, it takes ten minutes, and the streets around it, whitewashed houses fitted between the old columns, are the prettiest corner of the town.

The move  Walk up to the Kastro quarter above the harbour to see the ancient temple drums built into the Venetian wall, then wander the marble lanes around it, which most day-trippers never climb to.

Map  Kastro of Parikia

04

See

The Archaeological Museum and the marble that dates the world

The Archaeological Museum of Paros, beside the high school in Parikia, is small and easily skipped, and it holds one of the most remarkable objects in Greece. The Parian Chronicle is a marble slab carved in the third century BC that lays out the whole span of Greek history as a dated timeline, myth and fact side by side, a stone attempt to fix the calendar of the ancient world. Around it are the museum's other treasures: a headless winged Nike, a whole preserved Gorgon, and relief plates from a shrine to Archilochus, the seventh-century poet Paros gave the world and the first in Europe to write in the raw, personal, unheroic voice. It is a half-hour that anchors everything else you will see on the island. Check the opening days before you go.

The move  Give the Archaeological Museum half an hour for the Parian Chronicle, the Nike and the Gorgon, and read up on Archilochus first, since the poet is the thread that ties the island's antiquity together.

Map  Archaeological Museum of Paros

05

Time it

Naoussa, timed round the bars

Naoussa is the island's picture, a fishing harbour of blue boats and white houses that has become its most fashionable place, and it is genuinely lovely at the right hour and a scrum at the wrong one. By day the little port is postcard Cyclades, nets on the quay, caiques unloading, a ring of tavernas round the water. After dark the same lanes fill with the island's bar crowd and the harbour turns loud and expensive. The trick is to take Naoussa in the morning and the late afternoon, when the light is on the boats and the streets are quiet, and to be clear-eyed about the evening: a drink on the harbour is a premium seat at a busy show. See the fishing port for what it still is by day, and choose deliberately whether the night is your scene.

The move  See Naoussa's harbour in the morning or late afternoon for the boats and the quiet, eat where the fishermen land rather than on the loudest corner, and decide the nightlife on its own terms, not by accident.

Map  Naoussa harbour

06

See

The sunken fort at the harbour mouth

At the mouth of Naoussa's harbour, half in the sea, stands the stub of a Venetian fort, the Kastelli, its ruined watchtower rising straight out of the water at the end of a short breakwater. It is what remains of a far larger fortified settlement the Venetians built to guard the bay against pirates, most of it long gone under the waterline, and it is the most photographed thing in the town for good reason. You can walk out along the little mole to it in calm weather and stand where the harbour meets the open sea, with the fishing boats behind you and the bay in front. Go early or at dusk, when the light is soft and the harbour is not yet full, and mind your footing on the wet stone.

The move  Walk out to the half-sunken Kastelli at the harbour mouth in the calm of early morning or at dusk, take care on the wet stone, and shoot it with the fishing boats and the bay behind.

Map  Kastelli of Naoussa

07

See

The ancient marble quarries at Marathi

Inland from Parikia, on the old road towards Lefkes, the hillside at Marathi is honeycombed with the quarries that made Paros famous long before the beach clubs did. This is where they cut lychnites, the translucent, fine-grained Parian marble that ancient sculptors prized above all others, the stone of the Hermes of Praxiteles and, by most accounts, the Venus de Milo. The name means lamp marble, for the oil lamps the miners carried into the dark galleries. You can walk to the mouths of the ancient tunnels and stand at the abandoned nineteenth-century workings of the French company that, in 1844, cut the marble for Napoleon's tomb. It is unfenced, unpolished and almost always empty, and it is one of the most quietly astonishing places on the island. Take a torch and sturdy shoes.

The move  Drive out to Marathi, park at the village and walk up to the quarry mouths, bring a torch and proper shoes for the rough ground, and go in the cool of the morning, since there is no shade and no cafe.

Map  Marathi marble quarries

08

See

Lefkes, the mountain capital

High in the hills of the interior, some three hundred metres above the sea, Lefkes was the capital of Paros for centuries, when the coast was too dangerous to live on and the island pulled back from the pirates into the mountains. It is still the loveliest of the inland villages: a tumble of white houses down a green valley, marble-paved lanes too narrow for cars, a fine cathedral, and views that run to the sea and across to Naxos. Because it is a drive from the beaches, most visitors skip it, which is exactly why it holds the old rhythm the coast has lost, kafeneia under the plane trees, old men over cards, the shade and the cool that the shore never gives you in August. Come for a slow lunch and the start of the Byzantine road, and stay for the afternoon.

The move  Drive up to Lefkes for lunch and the cool air, wander the marble lanes and the cathedral square, and use it as the trailhead for the Byzantine road down towards Prodromos.

Map  Lefkes

09

Walk

The Byzantine road, walked on foot

From the edge of Lefkes an old marble-paved path drops down the valley towards the villages of Prodromos and Marmara, the Byzantine road, the oldest trail on the island and one of the oldest continuously walked routes in the Cyclades. It was laid in the Byzantine era to link the mountain settlements and their monasteries, paved in the island's own marble, and it has carried feet and mules for a thousand years. The walk is a little over three kilometres and mostly downhill, around forty-five minutes at an easy pace, through terraced hills scented with thyme and oregano, the sea opening ahead of you. Start early or late to avoid the heat, wear shoes with grip because the polished marble is slick, and carry water, since there is nothing to buy until you reach the villages at the bottom.

The move  Walk the Byzantine road downhill from Lefkes to Prodromos in the morning or the late afternoon, wear shoes with grip for the slippery marble, carry water, and arrange a bus or lift back rather than climbing it again in the heat.

Map  The Byzantine road

10

See

The inland villages, Marpissa, Prodromos, Marmara

Below Lefkes, on the eastern flank of the island, sit a trio of villages the visitors mostly miss: Marpissa, Prodromos and Marmara, the old settlements of the Kephalos country. They are proper working Cycladic villages, whitewashed and quiet, with narrow lanes, small chapels, the odd windmill, and fragments of ancient temples and Venetian coats of arms built into the houses, if you look up. Above Marpissa the ruined castle on Kefalos hill was the third the Venetians raised on Paros, and the walk up gives you the whole east coast. There are no boutiques here and no strip, only kafeneia and family tavernas cooking for the people who live there. Give them an afternoon, wander without a plan, and eat where the village eats, which is the cheapest good meal on the island.

The move  String Marpissa, Prodromos and Marmara together by car in an afternoon, look up for the ancient fragments and Venetian arms in the walls, walk up to the Kefalos ruin above Marpissa, and eat in a village taverna.

Map  Marpissa

11

Time it

The Valley of the Butterflies, timed for the moths

A few kilometres south of Parikia, in a walled garden fed by a freshwater spring around the monastery of Christos sto Dasos, Jesus of the Forest, is Petaloudes, the Valley of the Butterflies. The name is loose: what gather here in their thousands each summer are Jersey tiger moths, black and cream folded shut, a sudden flare of scarlet when they open, drawn to the damp shade and the trees. It is a cool, green, dripping refuge in the dry heart of a Cycladic summer, and worth the small ticket, but only if you time it. The moths are here from roughly June into the high summer and are stillest and most numerous in the cool of morning and evening. Come in the heat of midday, or too late in the season, and you may find a pretty garden and very few wings.

The move  Visit Petaloudes in June or July, early in the morning or towards evening for the coolest air and the most moths, tread quietly and never clap or shake the branches to make them fly, which harms them.

Map  Valley of the Butterflies

12

Drink

Moraitis, and the wine Paros kept alive

Paros has a wine worth crossing the island for, and a good place to learn it is the Moraitis winery, founded in Naoussa in 1910 and now run by the fourth generation of the family. The island's signature is a blend the appellation makes almost nowhere else, the white Monemvasia grape, the old Malvasia that Paros is credited with carrying down from Venetian times, married to the red Mandilaria. The vineyards run on the granite and schist of the island in the teeth of the meltemi, which keeps the vines low and the yields honest. A tasting here is an unhurried, unglossy hour, the wines poured beside the vines, and it reframes an island most people think of only for its bars. Book ahead in high season, and taste the Malvasia to understand what makes Paros wine its own thing.

The move  Book a tasting at Moraitis in Naoussa ahead of time in summer, ask specifically for the Monemvasia-Malvasia and the Mandilaria, and go earlier in the day when the light is on the vines and the room is quiet.

Map  Moraitis winery

13

Beach

Kolymbithres, and the hour to have it

Across the bay from Naoussa lies Kolymbithres, the island's signature beach, where the sea has worked huge blocks of granite into smooth, pale, almost lunar shapes that split the shore into a string of little coves and natural pools. The name means the fonts, for exactly those rock basins. It is genuinely beautiful and, sheltered inside Naoussa bay, unusually calm whatever the wind is doing elsewhere, which is why by midday in August it is heaving, the coves full and the sunbeds packed to the water. The answer is the clock. Come early, before the little boats bring the crowd over from Naoussa, or come late in the afternoon once the day-trippers have gone back, and the sculpted rocks and clear water are close to what drew people here in the first place.

The move  Take Kolymbithres early morning or late afternoon, not midday when it is packed, come by the little boat from Naoussa or by car, and climb over the granite to the quieter coves beyond the main cluster.

Map  Kolymbithres

14

Beach

The quiet north, Lageri, Monastiri, Santa Maria

The northern coast around Naoussa bay holds the beaches worth the small effort. Monastiri, tucked under the monastery on the bay's western horn, is a sheltered, family-easy cove with shallow, clear water. Santa Maria, a couple of kilometres east of Naoussa, is a run of white-sand creeks broken by low dunes, part organised and part wild, with good swimming and space to spread out. Best of the three for solitude is Lageri, reached on foot over soft dunes from the nearest road, undeveloped and often empty, and facing west for the sunset. None of these is a secret any longer, but away from Kolymbithres they still give you sand and sea without a wall of sunbeds. Bring water and shade for Lageri, where there is nothing to buy, and check the wind, since the open north takes the meltemi.

The move  Pick by need: Monastiri for a sheltered family swim, Santa Maria for room and white sand, Lageri for the empty walk-in beach and the sunset. Carry water for Lageri, and read the wind before you commit the north.

Map  Santa Maria

15

Do

The windsurf south, Golden Beach and Pounda

The south-east and south of Paros belong to the wind, and if you sail, this is why you came. Golden Beach, Chrysi Akti, is a long golden bay that the meltemi grooms into some of the most reliable windsurfing water in Greece, and neighbouring New Golden Beach has hosted the Professional Windsurfing Association's World Cup since the early nineties. Round on the west channel, Pounda faces Antiparos across a narrow strait that funnels the wind, and it is one of the finest kitesurfing spots in the Mediterranean. The same fact cuts both ways. For a beginner or a family wanting a calm swim, Golden Beach in a strong meltemi is no place to be, the sea whipped up and the sand flying. Read the forecast and pick your coast: come here to sail, go north or to a sheltered cove to swim.

The move  Head to Golden Beach or New Golden Beach for windsurfing and Pounda for kitesurfing, book a lesson or a board through one of the beach schools, and if you only want a calm swim, choose a different coast when the meltemi is up.

Map  Golden Beach

16

Do

Antiparos, the day trip across the channel

Ten minutes across the strait from Pounda lies Antiparos, the small, low-key island that Paros half forgets it owns, and it makes one of the best day trips in the Cyclades. The little car ferry runs constantly through the day, no booking, cash on board, and drops you a short walk from a chora that is quieter and more intimate than anything on Paros, a single main street of whitewashed houses winding up to a fifteenth-century Venetian kastro built as a ring of homes round a courtyard. The island's set piece is its cave, in the centre, a deep chamber of ancient stalactites reached by a long stair down, used as a sacred place since antiquity. Give Antiparos a whole slow day, the chora, the cave and a swim, and take an earlier ferry back rather than the last, which fills.

The move  Take the small ferry from Pounda across to Antiparos for a full day, walk the chora and the kastro, climb down into the cave, swim, and come back on an earlier boat rather than the crowded last one.

Map  Antiparos

17

Eat

Gouna, the fish the island dries in the sun

The most Parian thing you can order is gouna, mackerel split open flat, salted and left to cure in the summer sun and the sea air before it is grilled over coals. The drying concentrates the fish into something intensely savoury and faintly smoky that fresh mackerel never manages, and it is the surest sign that a taverna is cooking the island rather than the tourist menu. It comes simply, off the grill with oil and lemon and a squeeze of nothing else, and it is cheap, honest food that belongs to the working harbours and the villages more than the fashionable front. Ask for it by name, order it with a plate of the local capers and a cold ouzo, and you are eating what the island has eaten for as long as it has had sun and mackerel.

The move  Order gouna wherever you see it chalked up, especially in the harbour tavernas and the villages, take it grilled with lemon and a plate of capers, and treat it as the island's own dish, not a fallback.

Map  Naoussa tavernas

18

Eat

The Parian cheeses, and how to order them

Paros has a real dairy larder, and it rewards ordering by name. Xinomyzithra is the island's soft, tangy, faintly sour fresh cheese, made from the goat and sheep herds of the interior, good spread on bread or crumbled through a salad. Touloumotyri is the harder, sharper aged cheese, cured in a skin, with a long, salty, lingering flavour. Around them sits the rest of the island table: revithada, chickpeas baked slow and low overnight in a clay pot, the great Cycladic Sunday dish; the wild capers that grow along the coast and are put up in brine; and, in season, a karpouzopita, the honeyed watermelon pie the Aegean islands bake at the height of summer. Ask the taverna what is theirs, made on the island, and you skip the generic Greek menu for the food Paros actually makes.

The move  Ask for the Parian cheeses by name, xinomyzithra fresh and touloumotyri aged, add a revithada if it is on, and look out for a summer karpouzopita for something sweet the island bakes rather than buys.

Map  Lefkes tavernas

19

Eat

A fish dinner at a working harbour

For a proper fish dinner, follow the boats rather than the crowd. The best fish on Paros is landed at the working harbours, Naoussa, Parikia, the little port of Piso Livadi under the eastern villages, and eaten a table back from where it comes ashore. The rule is the same everywhere in the Aegean and worth repeating: fresh fish is sold by the kilo and priced by weight, so ask to see the catch, ask the price before it is cooked, and never let a plate arrive without knowing what it costs. Order it grilled whole and plain, with oil, lemon and a handful of greens, and let the fish do the work. Skip the harbour-front table with the picture menu and the tout at the door; the good places do not need to chase you, and the fisherman's own taverna rarely has a view to sell.

The move  Eat fish at a working harbour, ask to see and weigh the catch and agree the price before it is cooked, take it grilled whole and simple, and walk past any place with a tout and a photographed menu.

Map  Piso Livadi harbour

20

Drink

An ouzo and a plate of meze, the slow way

The cheapest good hour on Paros costs the price of a glass. Away from the cocktail bars, in the back lanes of Parikia and the village squares, the island still keeps the old ritual of ouzo or tsipouro taken slowly with a rolling procession of small plates, a little grilled octopus, some gouna, a few capers, a slice of cheese, tomato and bread, brought out as you drink rather than ordered all at once. There is no rush to it and no bill to fear; you sit, you talk, the plates keep coming, and an afternoon dissolves. It is the most Greek thing you can do on the island and the least fashionable, which is the whole recommendation. Find a plain place with locals in it, order a small carafe and let the kitchen decide the meze, and you have understood Paros better than a night on the harbour will teach you.

The move  Find a plain ouzeri or kafeneio with locals in it, order a small carafe of ouzo or tsipouro and let the meze come as it comes, and give it a whole unhurried afternoon rather than a quick drink.

Map  Parikia back lanes

21

Know

The ferry hub, and how to read it

Paros sits in the middle of the Cyclades and works as one of the great ferry crossroads of the Aegean, which is both its convenience and its catch. Parikia's port has fast and slow boats to Piraeus, roughly three to five hours depending on the vessel, and short hops to Naxos, Mykonos, Ios, Santorini and the smaller islands, which makes it an ideal base for island-hopping. The catch is August. Tickets on the popular routes sell out well ahead, so book your arrival and departure and any day-trip crossings a week or two in advance, not on the day. The high-speed catamarans feel the meltemi more than the big car ferries and are the first to be delayed or cancelled when it blows hard, so leave yourself a buffer around a flight home and never plan a tight connection on a windy forecast.

The move  Book your ferries to and from Paros a week or two ahead in summer, prefer the larger car ferries over the fast catamarans when the meltemi is up, and build a buffer around any onward flight or tight connection.

Map  Parikia port

22

The rule

Getting around, the bus, the car and the meltemi

Paros is bigger than it looks and the good things are spread out, the villages inland, the beaches at opposite ends, the wineries and the quarries off the main roads, so plan how you will move before you arrive. The public bus is cheap and reliable between the main towns, Parikia, Naoussa, Lefkes and the beaches, and perfectly good if you are staying put. To reach the marble villages, the north coves and Marathi on your own time, though, you want a small hired car, booked ahead in August when the fleet runs out. Give the open ATVs and buggies a miss unless you genuinely ride: they are behind a steady toll of tourist injuries across the islands every summer, on roads that are steeper, narrower and gustier than they look. And whatever you drive, read the meltemi, which decides the sea and the ferries as much as the roads.

The move  Use the cheap buses between the main towns, hire a small car booked ahead for the villages and quiet beaches, skip the ATV unless you truly ride, and check the wind each morning, since the meltemi shapes the day.

Map  Parikia bus station

23

Drink

Naoussa after dark, done honestly

Naoussa earns its name for the night, and there is no point pretending otherwise: the lanes behind the harbour fill after dark with bars and a well-dressed crowd, and for a night or two it is a genuine part of what draws people to Paros. Be clear-eyed about it. This is the expensive, see-and-be-seen end of the island, and a drink on the harbour costs what it costs. Do it once, properly, if it is your thing, then reclaim the rest of the trip: a quiet glass in a village square, a late plate of meze in the back lanes, a drink where the price is fairer and you can hear yourself. The trap is letting the Naoussa night become the whole of Paros, and paying harbour prices every evening for the privilege. The island that survives the bars is the one worth remembering.

The move  Give Naoussa's nightlife one good night if it suits you, then step back to the village squares and the quieter lanes for your other evenings, where the drink is fairer and the island is still itself.

Map  Naoussa old town

24

Buy

The things worth carrying home

Skip the resort boutiques for the things the island actually makes. A bottle of Parian wine from Moraitis or another island grower, a Monemvasia-Malvasia or a Mandilaria, is the souvenir that means the most and travels best. A jar of the local capers in brine turns any plate back home into a memory of the coast where they were picked. The island's cheeses, a piece of aged touloumotyri, carry well wrapped. Paros is also a marble island with a living craft tradition, so a small piece of worked stone or ceramic from a village workshop is a fair, real thing to take rather than a printed magnet. Buy from the growers, the grocers and the workshops in the villages and the back lanes rather than the harbour fronts and the airport, where the price climbs and the quality thins.

The move  Carry home Parian wine, a jar of capers and a piece of aged cheese from the growers and grocers, and a small worked marble or ceramic from a village workshop, not a harbour-front gift shop or the airport.

Map  Parikia shops

25

The rule

The trap to skip, and what to do instead

The single trap on Paros is the one the island now sells hardest: spending the whole trip on the fashionable strip, the Naoussa bars, the packed midday beach clubs, the harbour tables with the picture menus, and leaving convinced you have seen Paros. You will have seen the version built for the crowd, at the crowd's price, and missed the island underneath it. The cure is simple and it is the whole of this guide: climb to Lefkes and walk the marble road, stand in the ancient quarries at Marathi, give an hour to the Church of a Hundred Doors, taste the wine the island alone kept alive, find the quiet cove and eat the gouna a street back from the water. Do that and Paros stops being the fashionable middle child and becomes what it actually is, one of the fullest islands in the Cyclades.

The move  Give the strip one night if you like, then spend the rest of the trip inland and off the harbour, the villages, the marble, the quarries, the wine, the quiet beaches, which is where the real island is.

Map  Paros