Amorgos at the Edge of the World

Amorgos is not an island you arrive at by accident. It requires two ferries and a decision. The reward is a place of genuine, unperformed isolation—long and narrow, the island is essentially a single mountain range running east-west with small settlements clinging to both flanks and a coastline that alternates between sheer cliff and improbable turquoise bay.

The Monastery of Hozoviotissa is the defining image of the island. Built into the white limestone cliff face in the eleventh century, it appears to be not constructed but extruded from the rock itself—a narrow white vertical slab suspended three hundred metres above the sea. Inside, in a series of rooms built into the natural cavities of the cliff, monks have lived a life of deliberate solitude for nine hundred years.

The famous dive site at the Blue Cave near Katapola offers visibility of forty metres in water so clear it removes the psychological sense of depth. You float and look down through fathoms of blue as though suspended in atmosphere rather than water. Luc Besson filmed The Big Blue here in 1988, and the underwater shots require no enhancement: the sea does this naturally.

Stay in the village of Chora at the centre of the island, in one of the small guesthouses operated by families who have been here for generations. Eat at the taverna in the lower plateia, which serves food grown in the small valley below the village—fresh greens with olive oil, slow-cooked goat, a barrel wine that is rough and correct. Wake early. Walk to the monastery before the tourist boats arrive from Naxos. You will have it to yourself and the monks.