Pserimos

Pserimos is a small island in the channel between Kos and Kalymnos, with one village, no road network and around eighty permanent residents. It belongs administratively to the municipality of Kalymnos, and its year runs on the excursion boats that arrive from both neighbours in the morning and leave again in the afternoon.

The village

Avlakia, often called simply Pserimos, is the only settlement, set behind the main beach at the harbour. It stands on the site of an older village: house foundations and pottery have turned up in and around it, and the island's position between Kos and Kalymnos, within sight of the Turkish coast, kept it inhabited long after most islets of this size were given up. There are no cars. A dirt track crosses the village and runs through to the far side of the island; everything else is footpath.

Locals call the island Kappari, after the wild caper bushes on the hillsides. Capers and fish are what it sends out, and both appear on the tables of the tavernas along the beach, together with island olive oil and cheese. In winter the population drops to a couple of dozen.

Beaches

Avlakia beach is a crescent of soft sand in front of the village, shallow a long way out, which is why the day boats come here and why families do. Vathy, on the north coast, is a half-hour walk on a marked path to a cove of sand and pebble. Marathounda, to the west, is about forty-five minutes to a small pebble bay. Glistra, Korakia, Roussa and Trevathia are smaller again and take longer to reach. None of them has facilities of any kind, so water and shade travel with you.

The Thor Star wreck

Off the southeast side of the island lies the Thor Star, a 73-metre cargo ship built in 1965 and abandoned in 1997 after engine failure, then driven onto the rocks in bad weather. It broke into three sections and now lies on its side with the bow in about five metres of water and the stern at around fifteen. That makes it one of the more approachable wrecks in the Dodecanese: shallow, little current and usually good visibility, dived by beginners as well as by people who know what they are doing. Grouper, bream, scorpionfish and nudibranchs have moved into the hull.

Anchoring

The harbour bay is shallow and largely open. The quay inside the ferry mole is taken up during the day by the excursion boats from Kos and Kalymnos, and from late afternoon there is usually room to go stern-to. The bay suits settled weather: the meltemi funnels hard through the Kos to Kalymnos channel, and day-boat wash keeps the anchorage moving until the last of them has gone. Vathy, on the north coast, gives better shelter from the meltemi, with sand in three to seven metres and solid holding, but it is open to the east. Anchor on the sand rather than the seagrass, which will not hold.

That daily rhythm is what makes Pserimos a classic stop on a Greece blue cruise itinerary: a crew arriving under their own power in the late afternoon has the beach, the tavernas and the whole bay to themselves from about five o'clock, when the excursion fleet turns for home.

Walking the island

Footpaths run from the village across the island to the outlying bays, and there is enough of a rise to give a view over the channel to Kalymnos on one side and Kos on the other. The ground is dry and stony, with caper, thyme and low scrub rather than tree cover, so the walking is best done early. Some of the small bays on the far coast can only be reached on foot or by tender.

Practicalities

June to September is the dry season and the only stretch when all the tavernas are open. Supplies on the island run to what the village keeps for itself, so provisioning happens in Kos or Kalymnos before arrival. A daily ferry connects Pothia on Kalymnos with the harbour.