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Tourist information - Samothraki
Samothraki has one of the most dramatic profiles of all the Greek islands its dark mass of granite rises abruptly from the sea, culminating in the 1611-metre Mount Fengari. Seafarers have always been guided by its outline, clearly visible from the mainland, and in legend its summit provided a vantage point for Poseidon to watch over the siege of Troy. The mostly forbidding coastline provides no natural anchorage, but in ancient times the island was colonized by settlers from Thrace, with more recent migrations from Anatolia and Lesvos swelling the population. Landing is still very much subject to the vagaries of the notoriously unpredictable weather, but it did not deter pilgrims who, for hundreds of years, journeyed to the island to visit the Sanctuary of the Great Gods and were initiated into its mysteries. The Sanctuary remains the main archeological attraction of the island which, too remote for most tourists, combines earthy simplicity with natural grandeur.
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