Μύκονος · The party island of Greece: Little Venice at sunset, beach clubs till dawn, and sacred Delos next door
Watch the sun set from Little Venice, dance at Paradise until the sky turns pink, and take the boat to Delos, the birthplace of Apollo. Pricey, loud and gorgeous, and honest enough to admit it.
Greetings from Mykonos
Mykonos
We had a cocktail in Little Venice with the waves slapping the terrace, and it cost what a dinner costs at home. Worth it. Then dinner in the lanes, a pelican on the way, and at two in the morning Cavo Paradiso, with the DJ just getting started. We watched the sun come up over Paradise. Today we slept. Tomorrow, the first boat to Delos, to apologise to Apollo.
Hour by hour
Ancient Delos in the morning cool, a long lunch on the sand, sunset in Little Venice, dinner in Chora and a night that ends at sunrise.
Leave the old port for the sacred island and walk among the lions, the theatre and the mosaic houses before the heat and the crowds.
Back on Mykonos, head for the south coast and a long, lazy lunch at Ornos, or splash out at Psarou to watch the yachts.
Take the beach boat to Paradise, where the music starts on the sand in the late afternoon.
Squeeze onto a terrace over the waves for the sunset behind the windmills.
Eat late in Chora, then join the slow evening crawl along Matoyianni.
Up on the cliff above Paradise, the headliner comes on around 01:45. Stay until the sky over the sea turns pink.
Where to stay
Chora
Belvedere Hotel · Five-star hotel · €€€€
Chora
Mykonos Theoxenia · Design hotel · €€€€
Tagoo
Cavo Tagoo · Luxury hotel · €€€€
Only on Mykonos
What makes Mykonos different from every other Greek island, beyond the price of a cocktail.
Next door, Delos was so sacred that after Athens purified it in 426 BC, no one was allowed to give birth or to be buried there. The old graves were dug up and moved to Rhenia, and the finds from that purification pit, including one of the earliest pictures of the Trojan Horse, are now in the museum in Chora.
In 1958 a fisherman found a wounded great white pelican and brought it to Mykonos. Petros became the island's mascot for nearly three decades; when a car killed him in 1985 he was stuffed on the municipality's orders. Today three pelicans patrol the waterfront, and one of them is called Petros.
Myth says the great battle between the gods and the Giants was fought here, and that Heracles killed them on the island: the huge granite boulders strewn all over Mykonos are said to be their petrified bodies.
Panagia Paraportiani, 'Our Lady of the Side Gate', grew by the old castle gate from 1425 into the 17th century: four chapels at ground level and a fifth on top, all melted together under centuries of whitewash into one of the most photographed buildings in Greece.
“Ouzo it is. Mykonos is pricey, but damn, does this small island know how to party.”
Towns & villages
A white maze said to have been built to confuse pirates, now confusing everyone after midnight
The island's capital wraps round the old port on the west coast: a tangle of whitewashed lanes paved with stone and outlined in white, little churches on every corner, balconies dripping with bougainvillea, and shops, bars and galleries in every doorway. Matoyianni is the main lane of shops and the spine of the evening walk; Little Venice and the windmills of Kato Mili are its sunset end. By day it is a pretty village; after dark, in July and August, it is the busiest party street in the Aegean.
Captains' houses built straight onto the sea, and the island's sunset ritual
At the south-western edge of Chora a row of tall old houses stands with its feet in the water, wooden balconies painted red, blue and green hanging over the waves. They went up from the middle of the 18th century for captains and merchants. Today their ground floors are bars and cafés, and every evening the whole island seems to squeeze onto their terraces to watch the sun drop behind the windmills' hill and the sea, cocktail in hand and spray on the ankles when the wind is up.
Things to do
Culture
Spend a morning on the sacred island: the Terrace of the Lions, the theatre, the House of Dionysus and the climb up Mount Kynthos.
From the old port, Chora
Food & wine
Get a table on a terrace over the waves an hour before sunset and watch the sun go down behind the windmills. Expensive, crowded, unmissable.
Little Venice, Chora
Festival
The island's open-air superclub on the cliff, open since 1993: doors at 23:00, headliners around 01:45, last dance at 07:00. Over 18s only.
Above Paradise beach
Good to know
Ouzo it is. Mykonos is pricey, but damn, does this small island know how to party. If you want to come to Greece for a calm, cultural experience, honestly, skip Mykonos: there are much better islands that will hurt your wallet far less. Still here? Good. Mykonos is a small, rocky, windswept island of 85.5 km² in the middle of the Cyclades, with 10,704 people (2021) and, every year, well over a million visitors. Its white Chora is a maze of lanes around the old port, with Little Venice's balconies over the waves and a row of Venetian windmills on the hill. Since the 1960s it has drawn the jet set, then the hippies and nudists, then, from the 1980s, gay travellers from all over the world, and its south coast is now a string of the most famous beach clubs in the Mediterranean. Yet half an hour away by boat lies Delos, one of the holiest sites of ancient Greece, and in the middle of the island Ano Mera still keeps its monastery, its square and its cheese.
When to go
July and August are the party peak, when prices, crowds and the meltemi all hit their highest. June and September are warm, still lively, and cheaper. From November to March most clubs, beach bars and many hotels close.
Money, honestly
Mykonos is one of the most expensive islands in Greece, and the beach clubs most of all. Ask for prices before you sit on a sunbed or order fish by the kilo, use the buses and beach boats, and eat lunch in Ano Mera. Beaches are public, so your own towel on the free sand costs nothing.
If you want calm and culture
Be honest with yourself: if you came to Greece for quiet villages and museums, Mykonos is not your island. Try Tinos next door, Naxos, Paros, Sifnos, Folegandros or Syros instead, and come to Mykonos for one day, by boat, for Delos.
How long
Two to four days is plenty: one for Delos, one or two for the beaches and the nights, one to recover. Then take the boat to a quieter island.
Getting there
Easy: about 25 minutes by air from Athens, direct summer flights from much of Europe, or a fast boat from Piraeus or Rafina in a few hours.
Flights & ferries
A poor island that supplied the sanctuary next door, Venetian lords and Ottoman sultans, pirates and a sea battle in the harbour, a heroine of 1821, emigrants and, from the 1960s, the world's most famous party.
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