Sifnos

Sifnos built its reputation on two crafts. Pottery: the island's clay has been worked for millennia, and workshops still produce the brown glazed cookware, including the skepastaria and the mastelo pot, sold across Greece. And cooking: Nikolaos Tselementes, whose 1910 cookbook so dominated Greek kitchens that his name became the word for a cookbook, was born here, and the island keeps a strong food culture with slow-cooked chickpeas baked overnight in wood ovens. The landscape is terraced and dotted with white chapels, said to number 365, and a well-marked network of old stone paths, several hundred kilometres of them, links villages such as Apollonia, Artemonas, Kastro on its cliff, and the monastery of Chrysopigi on a rock joined by a footbridge.

History

Sifnos has been inhabited since at least 4000 BCE and belonged to the mainstream of Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age Cycladic culture; in antiquity it was very rich from its gold, silver and lead mines. From perhaps the 12th century BCE it was settled mostly by Ionian Greeks from Athens, and in the sixth century BCE pirates from Samos invaded it; little is known of its Roman and Byzantine centuries, though Roman sarcophagi in the lanes of Kastro and 80 Byzantine coins in its museum show it stayed well populated (Wikipedia, Sifnos).

What you'll find

• Kastro - a medieval village on a cliff with ancient walls beneath it.
• Chrysopigi monastery - a white monastery on a rock with a footbridge.
• The pottery workshops - traditional clay cookware still being made.
• The path network - hundreds of kilometres of marked old stone routes.

When to go

May, June and September for walking and swimming together; the paths are best in spring when the terraces are green. August is busy and hot, and the meltemi can blow hard.

Before you go

Beaches are modest, mostly small bays with limited shade. The island is popular with Athenians, so August books out. Accommodation and food prices are higher than on comparable islands, a consequence of the culinary reputation.

Nearby

Serifos lies north; Milos and Kimolos are south, all linked by the western Cyclades ferry line.

Key facts