Astypalea, Greece: An isolated spot a world away from Athens

Closer to Turkey than to the Greek mainland, sleepy Astypalea makes for a welcome change of pace (if you can work out where you're going)

Windmills at Chora (Alamy)

Judith Schalansky's 2009 Atlas of Remote Islands was a surprise bestseller. It describes, in hypnotic detail, islands the East German graphic designer had never actually visited. Nor ever intended to. The idea, if not the reality, of insularity is powerfully appealing. So when someone suggested a late summer trip to Astypalea, I quickly agreed.

Astypalea – a tiny Dodecanese island – was a nymph who caught the eye of Poseidon, rambunctious god of the sea, unavoidable hereabouts. The Byzantines called the island Table of the Gods because of its fertility. They also called it ichthyoessa which means "full of fish".

Modern visitors have been less impressed by nature's bounty. In his Companion Guide to the Greek Islands (1963), published when the local economy was based on harvesting natural sponges, Ernle Bradford says that in midsummer Astypalea is bare. The island also drew only the faintest of praise from Lawrence Durrell, who said it was slightly less depressing than Nisyros. But, like me, you have probably never heard of Nisyros either.

You get to Astypalea via Athens, where we chose to stay the night. There's a ferry from the city's port, Piraeus, to Astypalea's new port at Aghios Andreas, but, obviously, flying is quicker and marginally more dignified. Your craft is an Olympic-liveried De Havilland Canada Dash 8. I had forgotten how noisy turbo-props are. During climb-out I was thinking the vibration would stop in the cruise. It didn't, but on a clear day it's a lovely journey across some of the Aegean's most famous islands. In 40 minutes you arrive at Maltezana. The vista of scrubby, tree-less garrigue makes you question the perceptiveness of the Byzantines and their enthusiastic verdant and fishy tropes. The bleakness astonishes. Soon you are off on a ledge of a road winding past deserted bays, a cement works and several abandoned vehicles.

Kaminakia beach (Alamy)

Astypalea is only 117 nautical miles from Piraeus, but feels far more distant. You are closer to Turkey. Indeed, from 1537 to 1912, it was Turkish territory and its Turkish name is Istanbulya. It is small: 97 square kilometres, and the island is always described as "butterfly shaped". There is really only one road with a proper surface and even that does not run the whole length of the island.

Tholaria describes itself as a boutique hotel, evidence that Astypaleans have ambitions of an economy beyond sponges, although it is really no more than a collection of linked rooms on a hillside. There is a small pool, no bar, and service was, to be polite, unintrusive. Our room had a mezzanine and glorious views of the sea, but arrangements of dried flowers and a pervasive interior brown-ness lent an air of melancholy, even in sunshine.

There was an old German radio receiver whose dial cited Daventry, Cincinnati, Boston, Motala, Tokio, Moskau, Rom, Syrien, New York, Berlin, Wien, Schweiz, Ankara, Andorra, Sundsval, Lyon and Petrossan. This added to Tholaria's sense, not wholly pleasant, of being out-of-time. In sharp contrast, Hotel Pylaia, almost next door, is Astypalea's sole modern hotel, sophisticated in a Philippe Starck sort of way with dolphin-sound music.

We moved to Melograno Villas for the next few days. There are no decent maps of Astypalea, no street names to speak of and Google was not much help. Driving around in mounting confusion, we eventually persuaded a man from Tholaria to lead us on his motorino. It turned out that Melograno Villas was, indeed, up the unlikely looking half-made road we had actually found, but failed to believe, on our own reconnaissance. As instructed, we called proprietor Mihalis Makos, who arrived in the smartest car on the island, a shiny black, but slightly damaged, Nissan Qashqai.

Makos, in aviator shades and Ralph Lauren, is a passionate advocate of Astypalea, and Melograno is his proud manifesto. The style-pointers are urban and cosmopolitan: Smeg fridge, Nespresso, a fridge full of French champagne, a hot tub and a box of proper Cuban cigars. The language was "architectural", although amusing rustication in the shower room did not entirely compensate for fretful water distribution and suggested the (Athenian) designers had spent more time studying lighting catalogues than plumbing.

Unless you are very energetic, both Tholaria and Melograno are a drive from the centre of the main town, Chora, where you need to go to find a bar or a restaurant. The town is cartoonishly Aegean blue and white, a pretty cascade of cubes and alleys, dominated by the mighty Kastro, built by the Venetian Querini family who established themselves here in 1207. (Architect Carlo Scarpa's magnificent Fondazione Querini-Stampalia in Venice confirms the connection: "Stampalia" is a Venetian corruption of the island's name).

Besides the high-perched Kastro, eight redundant, red-roofed windmills, one converted into a bookshop-library, are the architectural headlines. On the way to dinner, you pass an amazing, crepuscular, men-only, 130-year-old bar with no name.

Restaurant choice is limited too. Barbarossa is well-established and serves serviceable fried cheese, tsatsiki, local goat stew, and deep fried red mullet. The very best map we found was its paper tablecloth. For those inclined to the mythic taverna, Akrogiali (which means "seashore") has wobbly tables on the shingle where you can eat "oyster fried balls", something you really must do, if only once.

Most often, we went to Livadi, a few kilometres out of town. It is approached by a road you would not wish to drive down even when entirely sober (unless you put your head under a blanket), but the local grannies seem to manage in their Hyundais. Astropelos is a simple beach restaurant run by Maria Fioravante, a striking woman with the bearing and locomotion of a Sophoclean chorister in a chiton, with a spritz of California. You listen to Bach in a disco-trance arrangement and eat spinach and chard pie or rabbit stew. We swam comfortably in early October.

Astypaleans are proud of their poetic beaches: Vatses, Kaminakia, Tzanaki, Papou and Schinontas, where the road ends. We looked at the last named. The price to be paid for isolation is a chemical loo, but nicely sited between ancient olive trees.

Reflecting on this, at the bar next to the harbourmaster's offices, we met a waitress from Manchester called Laura who has been here for 16 years. Her young son, she told us, looking sideways at someone grilling octopus on Homeric charcoal, wants an iPhone 6. Meanwhile, the wind rose. It is called the meltemi and is scheduled for May to September. The Greek name may derive from the Italian "mal tempo", bad weather. Time to go.

Back on the mainland, we had a day to explore the "new" Athens, now said to be arising from bad weather all its own. Bernard Tschumi's new Acropolis Museum lifts the city's spirits while the Stavros Niarchos Cultural Centre is planned to open next year. Alas, the talked-up Kiki de Grece, a wine and mezze bar between Syntagma and Plaka, was closed when we visited, and a grocery store called Not Just Greek Salad sounded promising, but was not at the advertised address.

Melograno Villas

We had dinner in Kolonaki, a swish neighbourhood, where you find smart shops such as Enny de Monaco and Retrosexual. The restaurant was Papadakis, hosted by TV celebrity Argiro Barbarigou. "For our American clients," the menu says "rocket is arugula, aubergine is eggplant, courgette is zucchini, shallots are not green onions, chickpeas are garbanzo beans." The precision of Papadakis is indicated by "cold-pressed agourelaio olive oil from Siteria with 0.3 per cent acidity".

We ate stamnagathi – wild chicory, rocket, lettuce, sunflower seeds, grape must, and pomegranate seeds. Then, octopus with honey, sun-dried tomatoes, sweet wine, and chips.

We were booked into the Hotel Grande Bretagne, a magnificent grande-dame of a hotel. Our designated room had the suffocating smell of dry-cleaning, so we refused it and, after a little hiatus, were given the Presidential Suite with a 12-seat dining-room, plush to soothe a tyrant and gilt to illuminate the dullest imagination. This dislocation seemed eloquent of modern Greece. Meanwhile, breakfast on the Hotel Grande Bretagne's roof with its heartbreaking view of the Parthenon is, for me, one of life's very greatest experiences. And I don't even like breakfast.

On the flight to London I thought 40 years back to my first Athens trip. That old travel-anxiety never leaves. When young and travelling, I always found a call home refreshed the spirit. Now I wait for an e-mail from the children with a photo attachment because that refreshes too. Everything changes, yet so much stays the same, especially in Greece where time, so often, stands still.

We flew Aegean in a brand new, blindingly white Airbus. At the front of the plane, we were served delicious new Greek wines from proper bottles. The remote island of Astypalea seemed a long, long way away.

Getting there

Athens is served from the UK by British Airways (0344 493 0787; ba.com), easyJet (0843 104 5000; easyJet.com), Ryanair (0871 246 0000; ryanair.com), and Aegean Airlines (0871 200 0040; en.aegeanair.com). Flights to Astypalea are operated by Olympic Air (olympicair.com) from Athens.

Staying there

Boutique Hotel Tholaria, Chora (00 30 210 24 33 063; tholaria.gr). B&B from €70.

Melograno Villas (00 30 210 898 3388; tresorhotels.com). B&B from €180.

Pylaia, Chora (00 30 224 30 61 001; pylaiahotel.gr). B&B from €86.

Hotel Grande Bretagne, Athens (00 30 21 0333 0000; grandebretagne.gr). Doubles start at €315.

Eating & drinking there

Akrogiali, Chora, Astypalea (00 30 224 30 61863).

Astropelos, Livadi Beach, Astypalea (00 30 224 306 1473).

Barbarossa, Chora, Astypalea (00 30 224 30 61 577).

Papadakis, Fokilidou 15, Athens (00 30 210 36 08 621).

More information

Discovergreece.com