Palairos

Palairos (also spelled Paleros) is a small coastal town in the Aetolia-Acarnania regional unit of western Greece, overlooking the Ionian Sea. Long known by its older name of Zaverda until 1928, the settlement sits beside the site of an ancient city whose fortification walls are believed to date back as far as the Mycenaean period, roughly 2000 BC. In antiquity Palairos was one of the more significant cities of ancient Acarnania and sided with Athens during the Peloponnesian War in 431 BC, a period when its walled acropolis is thought to have housed well over 10,000 people — far more than the roughly 3,800 residents recorded across the modern municipal unit in the 2021 census.

Today Palairos is a quiet base for exploring the Ionian coast, with the ancient hillside ruins overlooking a bay still used by boats sheltering from the open sea. Its position between Lefkada and the mainland ports of Preveza and Astakos makes it a convenient midway stop, and many gulet cruises in Greece call in here to combine a swim with a short walk up to the old walls before continuing along the coast.