These Party Islands in Greece Want to Change Their Image

It was across the time that the ferry eased itself into the port of Ios, an island within the Greek Cyclades, that I started to surprise if we had come to the best place. We — my husband and I, elder millennials on the cusp of center age — had been shoulder to shoulder with youngsters, hordes of them, youthful vitality bounding off their dewy pores and skin. Within the thick of summer season, the ferry’s windowless boarding space felt like a furnace. I felt a wave of claustrophobia. These children had come to get together. We had … not. We sought good meals, native wine, to by some means come house more healthy than once we left, just like the individuals who go to Paris and return 10 kilos lighter, “due to all of the strolling” and the unprocessed bread.

To paraphrase a well-liked meme: May the island do both?

For certain, there’s loads of respite to be discovered inside Ios’s 42 sq. miles. Goats nonetheless roam the island’s craggy hills and cliffs. It lacks an airport. However, because the Seventies, Ios has been recognized, primarily, for one factor.

“It’s a spot to get together,” mentioned Katerina Katopis-Lykiardopulo, a photographer who collaborated with the creator Chrysanthos Panas on “Greek Islands,” a coffee-table guide revealed in Could.

“Again within the day, there have been hippies, there have been medicine, there have been individuals sleeping on the seaside.” Ms. Katopis-Lykiardopulo mentioned. “Is it nonetheless a celebration island? Do youngsters nonetheless come? Sure, in fact. However the island is making an effort to be greater than that.”

Conscious that not each customer needs to rage till daybreak or cross off factors of curiosity with their fellow cruise ship passengers, intrepid operators on Ios, in addition to its world well-known Cycladic neighbors to the north and south, Mykonos and Santorini, are inviting vacationers to place up their ft and lean right into a model of wellness that hinges on slowing down.

Living proof: Calilo, a 3-year-old resort on the east coast of Ios, sufficient hairpin turns over the hills and away from the port to (nearly) banish the reminiscence of a billboard promoting a nightclub named Scorpion (“Don’t go away till you get stung”). A Disneyland for the spiritually optimistic, Calilo pushes motivational mantras as a substitute of five-for-one shot specials.

“After we enter this place, we go away the whole lot detrimental behind,” mentioned Sandy Parisi, a Calilo concierge with a disposition to rival the midafternoon solar, main us via a breezeway with shapes strategically lower out of its roof: when the sunshine hits proper, hearts spray out throughout the trail.

Within the white stone foyer, Ms. Parisi stopped beside a revolving marble and steel sculpture. It appeared like a person pierced by arrows, falling right into a pit.

“Right here, we throw away the darkness, the anger, all of the detrimental stuff,” Ms. Parisi mentioned. Phrases, sculpted out of steel, floated within the pit: “malice,” “negativity,” “lies.” She defined that the person was not falling however, in actual fact, being lifted up by phrases that jutted out of the arrows on heart-shaped ideas: “love, hope, pathos, which suggests ardour, in Greek.” So engrossed was I in taking a video of this carousel of excellent vibes that I nearly crashed right into a heart-tipped arrow that mentioned “smile.”

“The aim of this experiment, if I can name it that, is to deliver as a lot positivity, love and freedom to individuals as we will,” mentioned Angelos Michalopoulos, who owns and operates Calilo, in addition to six different eating places and accommodations on the island, together with his spouse, Vassiliki Petridou, and 4 of their 5 kids.

Motivational messaging is a part of Calilo’s holistic strategy to wellness. An on-site farm grows a lot of the produce served on the resort’s eating places, together with tomatoes flavorful sufficient to make you surprise for those who’d ever actually tasted one earlier than. The décor endeavors to shock and delight. The sunken eating tables by the principle pool seem like one thing out of “Alice in Wonderland,” and everywhere in the property, swings sway within the breeze. We swayed whereas consuming espresso. We swayed whereas studying books (or scrolling Instagram).

Over the course of three days, Calilo’s whimsy overtook me to the diploma that I nearly obtained over the grammatical idiosyncrasy of the neon mantra blinking above its bar (“Create a life you’ll be able to fall in love with”). When I discovered myself fixating on that dangling preposition, I reminded myself of the numerous liberties I’ve taken with grammar, and the truth that I used to be imagined to throw my cynicism within the pit upon arrival.

“Numerous our visitors say that after they come right here, they’re coming into a fairy story,” mentioned Ms. Petridou. “They are often children once more. Most individuals come to Greece for the swimming pools, the get together and the nightlife. We wish to break that cycle.”

Athens natives, the couple first got here to Ios in 2003 for a household trip. They had been astounded by the diploma to which it remained untouched — save for the chora, the Greek time period for an island’s foremost city, the place bars and nightclubs reigned.

“After seeing a few of these seashores, I used to be completely surprised,” mentioned Mr. Michalopoulos. “I mentioned to myself, both I’ve sunstroke or there’s a Russian nuclear dump someplace round right here, as a result of this place has two issues which can be fully opposed to one another: unbelievably lovely and virgin. This, you shouldn’t have in Europe. To be between two epically developed islands, Mykonos and Santorini, and by some means stay pristine — it’s paradoxical.”

Mr. Michalopoulos had a monetary agency in New York, the place he and Ms. Petridou attended college. They didn’t intend to get into the hospitality trade, however mentioned they noticed a chance to protect the island’s magnificence whereas growing it in a sustainable manner. Over the course of 5 years, they purchased 182 parcels of land from 2,137 landowners. They obtained approval from the native authorities to construct on 1 p.c of the land and go away the remaining untouched. They planted 70,000 timber, together with some centuries-old olive timber that had been beforehand marked for firewood. They employed 400 employees.

In 2019, they opened Calilo to lure a brand new sort of traveler to Ios. Calilo’s nightly fee begins at 660 euros, or about the identical quantity in {dollars} — considerably increased than these of the modest accommodations that populate the chora. The couple hopes the generated revenue will maintain their growth firm, which Mr. Michalopoulos calls “a prototype,” going.

“That is principally a land preservation venture moderately than a profit-maximizing venture,” mentioned Erica Michalopoulos, one of many couple’s daughters, who’s Calilo’s director of enterprise growth and partnerships​​. “However the important thing level is that we have to be financially sound to have the ability to protect the land.”

“This isn’t only a lodge,” added Mr. Michalopoulos. “Hopefully, it’s much more than that. It’s a proposal of a brand new manner of taking a look at a hospitality enterprise.”

Tourism accounts for about one fifth of Greece’s financial system, in response to the consulate general of Greece. Unchecked, the compulsion to drive up income can result in, as an example, the worldwide phenomenon that’s Mykonos: lovely seashores and legendary sunsets, sure, but additionally streets jammed with Mercedes Sprinter vans, Starbucks and day golf equipment that can charge upward of 150 euros for a solar mattress. After Ios, we had deliberate to proceed unwinding in Mykonos for 2 days. Mykonos had different plans.

“Mykonos is the get together island,” mentioned Tasos Pavlidis, a neighborhood concierge who tried to get my husband and me on Mykonian commonplace time: breakfast at 4 p.m., lunch at 6:30 p.m., dinner at 11 p.m. Sleep? “You don’t come to Mykonos to sleep,” mentioned Mr. Pavlidis.

“Mykonos is a planet of its personal,” mentioned Ms. Katopis-Lykiardopulo, the “Greek Islands” photographer. “We used to have individuals like Jackie O,” whose 1961 arrival on the island thrust it into the worldwide jet-setting scene, “now we have now Elon Musk,” she added.

Seaside golf equipment like Alemagou (which Mr. Pavlidis describes as “bohemian,” although it additionally attracts individuals who put on Cartier watches and hats that say EBITA) and Scorpios (affiliated with Soho Home, a members’ solely membership) entice swarms of hopefuls jostling for the possibility to pay 20 euros for an espresso martini. For individuals who like to bop, drink and people-watch after darkish, the chora of Mykonos exerts a magnetic pull. Despite this, in July, a brand new resort opened with the purpose of getting visitors to sit back out: Cali Mykonos, an amalgamation of fresh strains and opulent curves fueled by photo voltaic panels, a rooftop herb backyard and an on-site water purification plant.

“Final night time, we had a pair who went to a neighborhood seaside membership within the afternoon and deliberate to enter city within the night and get together,” mentioned Eric Mourkakos, Cali Mykonos’s managing companion. “They got here again right here to bathe, obtained to their room, and mentioned, ‘We realized, we have now no purpose to go away.’ I discovered them later, sitting by their pool beneath the pergola, trying up on the sky.”

One needn’t possess self-control of Herculean proportions to keep away from the thrum of the dance flooring in Santorini: in contrast with Mykonos and Ios, there aren’t a number of golf equipment. The madding crowd features otherwise on this volcanic island, with vistas so jaw-droppingly picturesque, they’re incessantly punctuated by social media influencers and soon-to-be brides and grooms, together with their attendant photographers.

Final 12 months, the Greek hospitality firm Andronis opened a resort — Andronis Wellness Concept — inviting Santorini guests to remain awhile and sink into some atypical choices, which embody a lantern-lit, hammam-like spa and a well being evaluation that makes use of a strand of hair for epigenetic testing. The check claims to supply insights into your habits, “and the way you would possibly change them to guide a more healthy life,” mentioned Carla Sage, Andronis’s director of wellness. “It’s rising in reputation. We’re doing one or two assessments each few days.”

Strolling via Andronis’s open-air corridors as nightfall falls feels transformative in and of itself (a good friend we met in Santorini in contrast the resort’s excessive, undulating partitions to the summary curves of the sculptor Richard Serra). Eating places on the island additionally current an argument for slowing down: dinner at Botrini’s, within the Oia village of Santorini, sprawls out over 11 two-or-three chew programs, greatest loved because the solar dips into the Aegean and the sky goes Rothko.

An epigenetics check seemed like a chore: an opportunity to get scolded, probably, indoors. Potential unhealthy vibes, detrimental vitality. Not the best way to finish a visit. We determined that the healthiest factor we might probably do, on our final full day in Greece, was take a wine tour. Wholesome for the thoughts and soul, a minimum of, if not for the corporeal physique.

Underneath the tutelage of Santorini Winetopia’s Marissa Diamanti, an effervescent tour information with an encyclopedic data of Hellenic wine, we dug our palms into the crumbly soil beneath the winery of the family-owned Hatzidakis Winery and marveled on the manner the vines had been saved low to the bottom and formed into baskets to guard the grapes from harsh solar and wind. Later, at Artemis Karamolegos, a vineyard 10 minutes down the highway, we swooned on the manner a chew of squid ink and fennel risotto elevated Pyritis, a white wine created from Santorini’s indigenous Assyrtiko grape. We indulged in one of the crucial holistic types of wellness: a wonderful meal with nice firm, outside, on a summer season afternoon.

After lunch, the 76-year-old proprietor of Art Space Winery, an artwork gallery, historical past museum and vineyard throughout the road from Artemis Karamolegos, unearthed an unlabeled bottle from beneath his bar and proffered it to us with a query.

“That is my moonshine. moonshine? You’ll attempt moonshine?”

Given my Cycladic understanding of wellness, there was just one proper reply.