Rhodes

Top things to do in Rhodes

1. 01

   Rhodes Old Town - the walls, the moat and the Street of the Knights

   history culture arts 👍 Popular

   A complete circuit of Hospitaller walls with a grassed dry moat you can walk right around, and inside it the Street of the Knights, a cobbled slope of the order's national inns that has barely changed. Ottoman mosques, a hammam and the Jewish quarter fill the streets behind it.

2. 02

   Palace of the Grand Master - the castle at the top of the walled city

   history 👍 Popular

   The order's fortress-headquarters, blown up by an accident in the 19th century and rebuilt by the Italians in the 1930s as a grand residence. The vaulted halls are floored with Hellenistic and Roman mosaics lifted from Kos, and the basement galleries cover the island's whole history.

3. 03

   Acropolis of Lindos - the Temple of Athena Lindia above the bay

   history scenic 👍 Popular

   A Doric sanctuary and its long colonnade sit on a sheer rock inside a later knights' castle, reached by stepped lanes and a rock-cut relief of a warship on the way up. The view drops into the horseshoe of St Paul's Bay on one side and the village on the other.

4. 04

   Archaeological Museum - the Knights' Hospital and the Aphrodite of Rhodes

   history culture arts ⭐ Highly recommended

   The order's infirmary, a huge vaulted ward with a courtyard of cannonballs, is worth the entry on its own. Inside are Mycenaean grave finds, funerary steles and the small marble Aphrodite wringing out her hair that Lawrence Durrell wrote about.

5. 05

   Prasonisi - windsurf the sandbar between two seas

   windsports adventure ⭐ Highly recommended

   At the island's southern tip a sand isthmus runs out to a rocky islet, with flat water on one side and chop and swell on the other, and reliable wind through the summer. It is one of Europe's better-known windsurf and kite spots; the spit is often submerged in winter.

6. 06

   Mandraki Harbour - the deer columns where the Colossus never stood

   history scenic

   Bronze deer on two pillars mark the harbour mouth, with three medieval windmills along the mole and the Fort of St Nicholas at the end. The Colossus stood somewhere in the city, not astride the entrance, whatever the engravings show.

7. 07

   Acropolis of Rhodes at Monte Smith - the Hellenistic city on the hill

   history scenic

   Free to wander and usually near empty: re-erected columns of the Temple of Apollo, a restored stadium and a small marble theatre on a ridge above the town, with the west coast and the Turkish mountains laid out beyond. Best late in the day.

8. 08

   Anthony Quinn Bay and the east-coast beaches - swim off the rocks

   nature wildlife scenic

   A pine-backed cove of clear green water and slabs to jump from, named after the actor who bought land here while filming on the island. The long sands at Tsambika, Agathi and Ladiko sit within a few kilometres of it.

9. 09

   Valley of the Butterflies (Petaloudes) - moths in a shaded gorge

   nature wildlife

   Wooden walkways and bridges climb a stream through oriental sweetgum trees whose resin draws Jersey tiger moths in their thousands from about June to September, when they cluster on the trunks. Outside those months it is simply a cool, pretty ravine.

10. 10

    Ancient Kamiros - a Doric town with nothing built over it

    history

    One of the island's three original cities, terraced up a hillside above the west coast and abandoned early, so the street grid, house plans, agora and huge public cistern survive without a later town on top. Almost no shade.

11. 11

    Filerimos - hilltop monastery, Doric ruins and the Way of the Cross

    history scenic

    The acropolis of ancient Ialysos, now a knights-era monastery with peacocks in the grounds, a subterranean chapel and an avenue of Stations of the Cross leading to a giant cross you can climb for the view over the airport coast.

12. 12

    Embonas and the Attavyros slopes - Rhodian wine and mountain tavernas

    food scenic

    The island's wine village sits high on the flank of its biggest mountain, growing Athiri and Mandilaria for cellars you can taste at, with grill houses doing spit-roast meat. Pair it with the drive down to the castles at Kritinia and Monolithos.

13. 13

    Rhodian tavernas - pitaroudia, melekouni and souma

    food

    Island cooking leans on chickpea fritters, giouvetsi baked in clay, goat with pilaf and sesame-and-honey melekouni bars handed out at weddings. Souma, the local distilled spirit, arrives at the end of the meal whether or not you ordered it.

Getting to & around Rhodes

Know before you go