Skopelos Island Wine & Plums

The neighboring island of Skopelos (Mamma Mia! fame) produces wine and its famous dried plums. Small producers make wine from indigenous varieties in a landscape of olive groves and beaches. The ferry from Alonissos is short, allowing day trips or longer stays.

What to do there

4 things to do

1. 1 Find the Wine That Survived 4,000 Years and One Blight Wine · Price: low

   Skopelos was producing wine before Athens existed. Phylloxera killed it in the 1940s. Small producers are reviving it now.

   In antiquity Skopelos was called Peparethos, and Sophocles himself called it 'evvotrin Peparetho' — 'Peparethos of the good grapes' — in his play Philoctetes, 5th century BC. The wine required 6-7 years of aging before it was considered fit to drink, and the physician Apollodorus recommended it specifically to King Ptolemy, ranking it among the finest wines of the ancient Mediterranean. Then phylloxera swept through the vineyards in the 1940s and destroyed what had survived 4,000 years. Today, a small recovery is underway. In Skopelos Town (Chora), accessible by ferry from Alonissos (50 minutes to 2 hours 15 minutes, roughly €11-13), ask taverna owners or shopkeepers: 'Ekhete topiko krasi apo Skopelo?' (Do you have local wine from Skopelos?) If you find any, drink it with the awareness that you're tasting the revival of something Sophocles mentioned.

   Backup: The island's wine tradition is documented in the local history section of Skopelos Town's small municipal museum. Even one paragraph about Peparethian wine makes the context concrete.

   Log Memory
2. 2 Find the Plums That Find Their Way Home Adventure · Price: low

   Legend says Skopelos plums, if planted on neighboring islands, find their way back home on the next boat. The terroir is so specific they won't grow anywhere else.

   Skopelos produces three types of plums: avgato (for sweets and jams), sour (for cooking and preserves), and a French variety with a legendary origin — it was smuggled onto the island hidden inside a potato. The running joke is that Skopelos plums 'find their way home on the next boat' if planted on neighboring Skiathos or Alonissos — they simply won't take root elsewhere. This is terroir applied to stone fruit: the same concept that makes Peparethian wine untranslatable to other soils. In local markets, grocery shops, and farm stands in Skopelos Town, look for the dried plum packages (stafidato or xero damaskino). Buy a small quantity of each type if available, taste them side by side, and ask the shop owner which variety is the 'original Skopelos plum' — they'll have a definite opinion.

   Backup: Any restaurant on Skopelos will have plum-based items on the menu or in house-made desserts. Ask what dishes use local plums. The fruit appears in everything from sweet pastries to savory glazes.

   Log Memory
3. 3 Climb 199 Steps to the Mamma Mia Chapel Adventure · Free · Optional

   Agios Ioannis Kastri sits on a 100-meter rock jutting from the northeastern coast. 199 steps to the top. The wine Sophocles praised grew in the hills surrounding it.

   This tiny chapel perched on a 100-meter-high rock outcrop jutting from the sea was where Sophie and Sky's wedding was filmed for the 2008 movie Mamma Mia. But you're standing on an island whose wine was praised by Sophocles in the 5th century BC — the same Sophocles who wrote Antigone and Oedipus Rex. The ancient vineyards occupied these same hills and coastal slopes. Drive or take a taxi to the Church of Agios Ioannis Kastri (northeastern coast, road from Skopelos Town toward Glossa, turn left at signs for Kastri). The 199-step climb takes 15-20 minutes at a comfortable pace. From the top, face east toward Alonissos — you can point out the approximate location of the Peristera wreck where ancient wine still rests on the seafloor.

   Backup: If the steps are closed due to weather or maintenance, Kastani beach below the chapel was also a filming location and has the same views from water level.

   Log Memory
4. 4 Taste the Cheese Pie That Is Fried, Not Baked Adventure · Price: low · Optional

   Skopelos strifti cheese pie is made from dough so thin you can read through it, then deep fried. Every other Greek cheese pie is baked. This one isn't.

   Strifti means 'spiral' or 'snail-shaped' — the dough is rolled to near-transparency (authentic recipes describe it as thin enough to read through without tearing), filled with feta and anthotyro (a local soft cheese), folded into a spiral and deep-fried in olive oil until golden. Every other Greek island bakes their cheese pie. Skopelos fries it. It's a single village's decision to cook differently from the rest of the country, maintained for generations. At any traditional bakery or taverna in Skopelos Town, ask for 'tyropita Skopelou' and watch if the cook rolls the dough by hand — that's the traditional method. The frying should happen fresh, not reheated. Eat it while still hot: the crisp exterior turns soft within minutes.

   Backup: If strifti isn't available, Skopelos also makes cheese-stuffed almonds (amygdalota), honey pastries, and prune jams using local plums. Any of these are worth trying as expressions of the island's specific larder.

   Log Memory

Insider tips

• The old town (Hora) is beautiful

• Local wine in tavernas

• Less developed than Skiathos

• Combine with Peristera diving