How Paros is the Best Island in the Cyclades

It was an early morning in May, the first month of the tourist season in the Greek Isles. I was traveling with an Australian budget travel company called Busabout and found myself to be the only American out of about 30 Aussies and Kiwis.

We were scheduled to take an unassuming sailboat out to some tiny islands off the coast of Paros and to see some of the bluest water in the world at the blue lagoon off the islet of Tigani.

Our boat driver was a typically swarthy Greek man with a friendly smile and no English, named Nico. He eagerly pointed out a giant, vertically jutting rock island bizarrely covered with goats. “How did they get there? Who put them there?” we asked, but Nico merely shrugged and smiled. The Cyclades is a place where you uncover the delights of mystery. He pulled our boat adjacent to another such rock island and indicated we should jump off the boat into crystalline waters and swim about 100 yards to it. The rock was not topped with goats but a beautifully white, blue roofed stone church, complete with a bell tower. The bravest of us threw ourselves into the still frigid early-morning waters, shocking our systems but laughing through it as we raced to the rocky islet.

The water around Paros is strikingly clear but notably devoid of fish and plant life due to the high concentration of salt in the Adriatic Sea, this gives the contrasting impression of a watery desert, infinitely vast and unknown. We scoured the rock to the top and climbed the bell tower, hanging from the hand woven rope to ring the bell. From that height, ecstatically chiming the bell, we were present in the thrill of living. All around us was empty sea, with tiny rocklets and distant sailboats. The curvaceous shoreline of Paros on the horizon with its long sandy beaches (some of the only non-pebbly beaches in the Cyclades) and dramatic cliffs, looked serene and perfect.

We returned to the boat feeling exalted and ready for more. Nico grinned knowingly at us as he lead us to the blue lagoon, which is an extremely azure spot of water that reaches much deeper than the light cerulean shallow waters around its perimeters. This made for very picturesque images of cannonballs off the boat into the lagoon.

After we had our fill of swimming we set up camp on the nearby beach of Tigani, which had a volleyball net waiting for us.

There we grilled squid that Nico and some of our group had casually caught for lunch.

I spearheaded all of us girls taking topless pictures holding our breasts and lifting our bathing suit tops high above our heads in an image that I believe perfectly encapsulates the moral lesson of Paros, to live freely, fearlessly and with passion.