9 Dodecanese Hotels Beyond the Medieval Walls

Rhodes old town is the largest inhabited medieval town in Europe. Four kilometres of walls, built and rebuilt by the Knights Hospitaller between 1309 and 1522, enclose about 6,000 people who still live inside them — in houses, above shops, on lanes where cars mostly cannot go.

The Knights were a crusading order who took Rhodes after losing the Holy Land, held it for two centuries, withstood one Ottoman siege in 1480 and lost the island in 1522 to a force that has been estimated at a hundred thousand men. Their Street of the Knights, where the order's national chapters had their inns, survives almost intact and is the most complete medieval street in the Mediterranean.

An Italian layer nobody expects

Italy held the Dodecanese from 1912 to 1943 and spent heavily, restoring the medieval town and building a new administrative quarter in a rationalist style along the harbour. Some of the restoration was heavy-handed and some of it saved buildings that were falling down. The Italian post office, market and government house are still in use.

The islands

Rhodes town has the walls, the Palace of the Grand Master and the Italian quarter.

Lindos, an hour south, is a white village below an acropolis on a rock, with a Doric temple at the top and a beach where St Paul is said to have landed. Cars stop at the edge and donkeys carry what people will not.

The Rhodian coasts divide by wind: the east is sheltered with the sandy beaches and the resorts, the west takes the meltemi and is where the windsurfers go.

Symi, an hour by boat, is a harbour of neoclassical houses in ochre and rust climbing both sides of a bay, built on the nineteenth-century sponge trade.

Kos and Patmos, further north, have respectively the beaches and the monastery where Revelation was written.

Rhodes also claims around 300 days of sunshine a year, which is among the highest in Greece.

The nine below are grouped that way.

Lindos

The village under the acropolis.

Lindos Blu Luxury Hotel & Suites occupies a clifftop above Vlicha bay with an adults-only policy, infinity pools and the acropolis along the coast. It is the best hotel on the island.

Melenos Lindos sits inside Lindos village itself in a restored captain's house on the hillside, built in terraces with a handful of rooms and the acropolis directly above.

Lindos Grand Resort & Spa occupies a large clifftop site near Lindos with several pools, a spa and full family facilities.

The Rhodian coast

Resorts along the sheltered east.

Casa Cook Rhodes sits at Kolymbia in a low white property with an adults-only policy, a beach and a deliberately pared-back interior.

Atrium Prestige Thalasso Spa Resort occupies a beachfront estate on the east coast with several pools, a very large spa and a long-standing family reputation.

Sheraton Rhodes Resort sits at Ixia on the west coast with gardens, a pool and the windsurfing water in front.

Rhodes town

Inside and beside the walls.

Kokkini Porta Rossa occupies a restored building inside the medieval walls with a handful of rooms, a courtyard and the Street of the Knights nearby. There is very little at this standard inside the walls and this is it.

Rodos Park Suites & Spa sits just outside the old town with a pool, a spa and the shortest walk through the gates.

Symi

An hour by boat.

The Old Markets occupies a restored nineteenth-century merchant's house on the Symi harbour, with a handful of rooms and the amphitheatre of ochre houses around it.

What we have left off

The small guest houses inside Rhodes old town are excluded, and they are the only way most people sleep within the walls. They are guest houses rather than hotels.

What to do

Walk the Street of the Knights early, before the cruise passengers, and go into the Palace of the Grand Master, which the Italians rebuilt in the 1930s as a residence for Mussolini that he never used.

Go up to the Lindos acropolis before nine, on foot rather than by donkey, and look down at the two bays either side.

Take the boat to Symi for a day, and stay for the evening if you can, when the harbour lights come on and the day boats have gone.

Swim on both coasts to understand the wind: the east for flat water, the west at Ixia and Prasonisi for the meltemi.

See the Valley of the Butterflies in summer, where Jersey tiger moths mass on the trees, and keep quiet — the noise of clapping, which guides used to encourage, exhausts them.

Practical notes

Rhodes has a busy international airport with heavy European traffic. Ferries connect Symi, Kos, Patmos and the Turkish coast at Marmaris.

May, June, September and October are ideal. July and August are very hot and the old town is full by mid-morning with cruise arrivals. Winter is mild and most of the coast closes.

The old town is cobbled and largely vehicle-free. Luggage arrives on foot or by handcart.

Questions people actually ask

Can you stay inside the walls?

Yes, but the inventory at this standard is tiny. Most accommodation within the walls is small guest houses.

Rhodes or Symi?

Rhodes for the medieval town and the beaches. Symi for a harbour of neoclassical houses and almost no development.

Which coast for beaches?

East for sheltered sand, west for wind and windsurfing.

How many nights?

Six. Two in the old town, three on a coast and a day to Symi.

If you only book one