Not the postcard Cyclades. This is the Peloponnese, where the islands sit closer together and the crowds thin out, and the whole thing was planned end to end by Butterfield & Robinson – every transfer, every boat, somebody with us the entire way.
One night in Athens, then across to Amanzoe above Porto Heli, which was the base for the week. Hydra first. Then Spetses, circled on bikes – eighteen kilometres of coast road, with a stop at limestone caves where the water filters down through porous rock and comes out carrying calcium, building the formations over about a million years.
The long day ran three hours south by boat to Monemvasia, the fortress town grown into its own rock, with a local guide for the whole stretch. We walked up into it slowly, before lunch.