The next island over

The next island over

For every crowded island the summer has found, a quieter one sits a ferry ride away, though the tidy swap oversells both the distance and the runway.

Elias Andreadis

The fishing village of Mandrakia on Milos, Greece, small boats moored in a calm Cycladic harbor, no identifiable people, for the piece on swapping crowded European islands for quieter ones a ferry away

Photo Jesse Paul / Unsplash

For every crowded island the summer has found, a quieter one sits a ferry ride away. Euronews named five: La Gomera for Tenerife, Solta for Hvar, Serifos for Santorini, Procida for Capri, Luing for Skye. The idea mostly holds, but the tidy version oversells two things, so know both going in:

The swap is thematic, not a hop: Serifos sits 127 km from Santorini, a different corner of the same sea
Four of the five are genuinely airport-free; La Gomera is the exception, with small Binter flights from Tenerife
What you gain is a working island: a harbor that still lands fish, a bakery with one queue
What you give up is the polish the crowds paid for, fewer restaurants, shorter seasons, a bus that comes when it comes (Procida bans non-resident cars in season)

Buy the ticket, and let the clerk mishear the name.