Our family had a wonderful four night stay at Popi’s cottage (Anemomilos - Greek for “windmill”). Her mother -in-law, Mrs. Panagioto, is the resident hostess, and couldn’t have been more hospitable. She picked us up from the ferry, brought us fresh vegetables from her garden and zucchini cakes from her kitchen, and provided lots of good advice and grandmotherly tips about life on Koufonisi. While Mrs. P’s English is limited, we had no problems communicating in person, while Popi handled all of the email communication prior to our arrival.
The apartment is the full upper floor of a beautifully situated house that overlooks the sea and the island of Kerros. It’s spacious, airy and has plenty of private outdoor space. Appointments are clean and modern, and certainly everything we could have wanted for our stay. The location is about a ten minute walk from the port and main town area. We hired a couple of bikes for our stay which made trips to the market even easier. There’s a small sandy swimming area right across from the house, or in five minutes you can walk to Finikas Taverna with its white sand beach and terrific Greek cuisine. Walking further along the shore will bring you to more sandy beaches with turquoise waters, culminating at remote, crescent-shaped Pori beach about forty minutes walk from Anemomilos.
No review would be complete without a word about Koufonisi itself. This is a very special place....we found it to be a perfect mix of remoteness and convenience. Enough visitors to support a number of high quality restaurants, a few interesting shops, and a couple of reasonably well-stocked markets. However, the only vehicles for hire are bicycles, and we didn’t see any Jet-Skis or powerboats pulling parasailors. The beaches are clean and simple - bring (or buy) you own umbrellas and chairs. There’s some ongoing development, but by and large much of Koufonisi’s land remains for agriculture and there’s an active local fishing industry. While most of the island is walkable or bikable from Popi’s, there’s also a responsive local taxi service just a phone call away.
We highly recommend Anemomilos and Koufonisi for terrific Greek island holiday. Thanks Popi and Mrs. P!
Dave
Boxborough, MA USA