Wander the lanes of Pyrgi slowly; the xysta decoration rewards close looking — no two patterns are quite identical. The central square, the church of Agioi Apostoloi with its 17th-century frescoes, and the Chios Mastic Museum round out a visit that takes a leisurely half-day.
Enter Mesta through one of its narrow original gateways and the defensive logic becomes immediately physical: the outer walls form an unbroken perimeter, the interior lanes are deliberately narrow and shaded. The twin churches of the Old and New Taxiarches sit at its heart.
The katholikon's interior mosaics — gold-ground depictions of the Crucifixion, the Washing of the Feet and other biblical scenes — represent some of the finest surviving Byzantine art in Greece, executed by master craftsmen from Constantinople in the 11th century.
Stone houses, some still structurally intact, stack up the cliff face exactly as they were left after 1822. There is no entry fee, no gift shop, no interpretive panel — just the physical fact of an abandoned settlement. Wear sturdy shoes.
The island's capital is a working port town rather than a tourist set-piece. Its old Kastro quarter, with remnants of Byzantine and Genoese fortifications, narrow lanes and the Giustiniani Palace Museum, rewards an afternoon's exploration.
South of Chios Town, Kampos was once home to wealthy merchant families who built elaborate stone mansions surrounded by walled citrus orchards — a unique agricultural-aristocratic landscape comparable to nothing else in the Aegean.
