The Sporades are green. That sounds like a small thing until you have sailed the Cyclades, where the islands are bare stone — here they are covered in pine down to the waterline, and the contrast is the single best reason to choose this corner of Greece over the famous one.
It is also a pure bareboat market. Our 250 boats here top out at about €9,600 a week, the lowest ceiling of any Greek region, because there is no superyacht business and no day-charter scene — just sailing yachts, 185 of them against 62 catamarans, averaging 13.2 metres. Rates start around €980.
The geography gives you a gentle start. Of the 250 boats, 158 are at Volos on the mainland, inside the Pagasetic Gulf — a large, almost enclosed bay with its own anchorages. That means your first and last days are in sheltered water and the islands come in the middle of the week, which is the opposite of the Cyclades arrangement. A further 50 are on Skiathos itself if you would rather begin among the islands.
The thing that makes this region genuinely unusual is what lies at its eastern end. The National Marine Park of Alonissos is the largest protected marine area in the Mediterranean, 2,491 square kilometres, created for the Mediterranean monk seal — one of the most endangered marine mammals in the world. The rules there are real and specific: vessels are generally prohibited within three nautical miles of Piperi, the strictly protected breeding island, without authorisation, and boats must keep 400 metres off the shore at Gioura. The park is divided into zones, with most human activity confined to the populated Zone B.
The meltemi reaches here but the islands and the gulf break it up, so this is middle ground: more wind than the Ionian, considerably less exposure than the Cyclades.
