Mountain Trails & Villages

Most visitors to Rhodes see only the Old Town and the beach resorts. But the island's mountainous interior — rising to 1,215 m on Mount Attavyros — is a very different world: forested with pine and cypress, dotted with wine-producing villages, and networked with ancient paths that once connected the island's farming communities.

We walk from the village of Embonas through the high vineyards to the summit of Attavyros, the island's highest point and site of a temple to Zeus Atabyrios from which offerings were reportedly visible from Crete on clear days. The ruins of the ancient city of Kameiros on the northwest coast, set above terrace gardens overlooking the sea, are a highlight of any visit to Rhodes.

In the Profitis Ilias forest — a 780 m wooded massif in the island's centre — the atmosphere is entirely unlike the coastal Rhodes, with old-growth Calabrian pine, wild orchids in spring, and complete tranquility even in high season. The contrast with the buzzing holiday resort Rhodes is startling and utterly refreshing.