Ten Aegean, Ionian and Israeli Coast Places from Lefkada to Ashdod

Lefkada joins the mainland by a causeway and floating bridge, so the trail starts on an Ionian island you can reach on foot. Settled by Corinthians in antiquity, it joined Greece in 1864 and is now known for windsurfing around Vasiliki.

Zakynthos, also called Zante, was governed by Venice from 1484 to 1797, and the Venetians nicknamed it Fiore di Levante, the Flower of the East. It is the third largest Ionian island, with 41,180 residents at the 2021 census.

Milos is the southwesternmost of the Cyclades and a volcanic island whose obsidian was traded to farming villages across the Near East. It also gave the world the Venus de Milo, now in the Louvre.

Ios lies about halfway between Naxos and Santorini and has only 2,299 residents at the 2021 census, down from around 3,500 in the twentieth century. Tradition holds that Homer died and is buried here.

Chios is the fifth largest island in Greece and is known as the Mastic Island for its mastic gum exports. It holds the 11th century Nea Moni monastery, and in 1822 Ottoman troops massacred and enslaved tens of thousands of its Greek population.

Samos sits only 1.6 kilometers from the Turkish coast across the Mycale Strait. In antiquity it was a rich city-state, and it was the birthplace of Pythagoras, Epicurus and Aristarchus, the first known person to propose that the Earth revolves around the Sun.

Rhodes is the largest of the Dodecanese and their historical capital. It was home to the Colossus of Rhodes, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the Knights Hospitaller ruled it from 1310 to 1522.

Jaffa is an ancient Levantine port settled in the Early Bronze Age that traded between Egypt, the Levant and Cyprus. Lebanese cedars for the Temple in Jerusalem came through it, and it was the departure point of the prophet Jonah. It was incorporated into Tel Aviv in 1950.

Ashkelon was established in 1949 as Migdal and renamed in 1953 after the ancient port of Ascalon, which was destroyed in 1270. Today it is the third largest city in its district, with 166,864 residents as of 2024.

Ashdod was established in 1956 about 6 kilometers northwest of an ancient Philistine city of the same name. Its port handles about 60 percent of Israel's cargo, making it the country's largest, and the city has 228,562 residents as of 2024.