Rhodes

What Rhodes actually is

Rhodes is a big island by Greek standards — 78 kilometres long, with mountains down the spine and a coastline that changes character completely depending on which side of it you stand. At the northern tip sits Rhodes Town, and inside Rhodes Town sits the walled medieval city that the Knights of St John built and that people fly here to see. Everything south of that is beach resort, farmland and, at the far end, near-empty coast.

This is not a one-decision island like Santorini. It has genuine range: package all-inclusive resorts, small guesthouses inside a fortified fourteenth-century town, quiet family beaches, a nightlife strip with a reputation, and a windsurf coast. The mistake people make is assuming those are interchangeable. They are forty minutes to an hour and a half apart, and they suit completely different holidays.

The season is long. Rhodes gets more sunshine hours than almost anywhere in Greece, and the sea usually stays comfortable into the second half of October, which is why the island fills with people who have learned to avoid August.

Staying inside the Old Town: read this first

The Old Town is the reason Rhodes is on your list, and it deserves the reputation. It is the largest inhabited medieval town in Europe, entirely enclosed by walls and a dry moat, with the Street of the Knights running up to the Palace of the Grand Master and a maze of lanes behind it where people still live.

Staying inside the walls is a real experience and we book it often. But be clear about what you are agreeing to.

The lanes are cobbled with sea-worn stones set on edge, which is punishing on wheeled luggage and worse on ankles. Most lanes take no vehicles at all, so a taxi drops you at a gate and you walk the last five to ten minutes with your bags — ask which gate and how far before you commit. The buildings are protected, which means small windows, thick stone that holds the day's heat well past midnight, and air conditioning that is sometimes retrofitted and modest. Almost nothing inside the walls has a pool.

And it is loud. The bars around Hippocrates Square run late, and sound bounces between stone walls in a way modern glazing does not fix. Rooms on the quieter southern lanes near the Jewish Quarter are a different proposition from rooms above the main tourist run.

Our honest read: the Old Town is superb for two or three nights, ideally in May, June, September or October. For a two-week family beach holiday in August it is the wrong building.

The wind decides your beach week

This is the thing nobody puts in the brochure. Rhodes sits in the path of a persistent north-westerly that blows through most of the summer, and the island's two coasts respond to it completely differently.

The west coast — Ixia, Ialyssos, Kremasti — takes it head on. Afternoons are breezy to genuinely windy, the sea is choppy, and the beaches are pebble and coarse shingle rather than sand. This is excellent news if you windsurf or kitesurf, and Ixia is one of the better spots in the Mediterranean for it. It is bad news if you wanted a flat sea and a sun lounger, and it catches people out every year because the west coast hotels are close to the airport and often cheaper.

The east coast — Kallithea, Faliraki, Afandou, Tsambika, Lindos, Pefkos — is sheltered by the island's own hills. Calmer water, sandier beaches, warmer swimming. For a beach holiday this is where you want to be, and it is worth the extra transfer time.

Where to stay

Rhodes New Town wraps around the Old Town: Elli beach, the aquarium, shops, restaurants and Orfanidou street, which is a wall of bars. Convenient, walkable to the medieval town, mixed in quality.

Ixia and Ialyssos are the four and five-star strip on the west coast, fifteen minutes from the airport and ten from town. Good hotels, good spas, reliably windy afternoons.

Kallithea and Ladiko are rocky, scenic and good for snorkelling, with the restored Art Deco spa complex at Kallithea Springs and the small cove at Anthony Quinn Bay. Little actual sand.

Faliraki is the big one: a long sandy bay with large family all-inclusive hotels along it, and, at the northern end, the nightlife strip that gave the resort its reputation in the 1990s. The two ends genuinely are separate, and a well-placed family hotel here is a perfectly quiet holiday — but check which end you are on.

Afandou and Tsambika are quieter beaches with fewer hotels and better sand than most of the island.

Lindos is the postcard: whitewashed village under an acropolis on a rock, with St Paul's Bay below it. It is genuinely beautiful and it is a long way south — around 55 kilometres from the airport, an hour or more by road. The village itself is stepped and vehicle-free, so hotels are small and luggage is carried, sometimes by donkey and often by you. Most of the larger hotels are actually in Pefkos or Vlicha, a few kilometres away.

Pefkos, Lardos and Kiotari run down the south-east coast: quieter, newer, resort-focused, and 75 to 90 minutes from the airport. Cheaper per star than the north, but you will not stroll into the Old Town for dinner.

Hotel stock and what a budget buys

Unlike Santorini or Mykonos, all-inclusive on Rhodes is real and widespread, particularly at Faliraki, Kiotari and Kalathos. For a family that wants to stop counting, it works, and the standard at the better five-star properties is high.

Roughly, in May, June or October: 65 to 90 EUR per person per night gets a solid four-star on the east coast, often all-inclusive. Around 100 to 140 buys a good five-star with a proper spa and several restaurants. Inside the Old Town, small heritage properties run 90 to 180 EUR per room per night and price on scarcity rather than season. In August, expect all of that to roughly double, and the good family hotels to be gone by February.

Be a little sceptical about stars here. Rhodes has older stock that was rated years ago and has been maintained unevenly. Renovation year matters more than the rating, and it is one of the specific things we check before quoting.

Getting there

Rhodes International Airport (RHO) is at Paradisi on the north-west coast, about 14 kilometres from Rhodes Town — 20 to 25 minutes to the Old Town, 15 to Ixia, 40 to 50 to Faliraki, an hour or more to Lindos and up to 90 minutes to the far south. Those numbers stretch in July and August, when the coast road backs up.

Ferries connect Rhodes to the other Dodecanese islands and to Turkey; the fast boat to Symi takes roughly an hour and is the best day trip on offer.

To be clear about our role: outside Turkey we quote accommodation through partner agencies. Our own vehicles and drivers operate in Antalya and along the Turkish coast, not in Greece, so a Rhodes transfer is arranged locally and shown in your offer if you want it.

When to go

May and June are excellent: 24 to 30 degrees, everything open, the countryside still green and the sea warm enough by early June.

July and August are hot at 32 to 38 degrees, and the Old Town in particular becomes an oven that does not cool down at night. This is also when prices peak and when families are locked in by school holidays. Book early and choose a hotel with shade.

September and October may be the best window on this island. The sea is at its warmest, the crowds thin from mid-September, and swimming holds up well into the second half of October.

November to March is mild and green, with rain. The resorts close almost completely, but Rhodes Town keeps working as a real town, which makes a winter city break here quietly enjoyable and very cheap.

What to do

The Palace of the Grand Master and the Archaeological Museum fill a morning. The Valley of the Butterflies at Petaloudes is worth it between June and September, when the Jersey tiger moths cover the tree trunks. Epta Piges, the Seven Springs, is a shaded walk and a cold stream in the middle of a hot island. Prasonisi at the southern tip is a sandbar where two seas meet, calm on one side and rough on the other, and it is a serious kitesurfing destination. Symi, an hour by fast boat, is the day trip people remember.

Who should skip Rhodes

If you want the whitewashed Cycladic look, this is not that island — Rhodes is Ottoman, medieval and Italianate, and it looks nothing like Santorini. If you want a quiet, undeveloped Greek island, the north coast is heavily built and busy in season. And if you have limited mobility, be careful with the Old Town and with Lindos: both are stepped, cobbled and largely closed to vehicles.

Getting a real price

Rhodes has more genuinely different products than almost anywhere we quote, and the same nightly budget buys a very different holiday depending on coast, board type and how recently the hotel was refurbished.

Tell us your dates, how many of you there are, and whether the priority is the Old Town, a calm beach or an all-inclusive the children will not escape. A consultant replies within one working day with two or three properties, the real transfer time from the airport for each, and the reasoning behind the shortlist. The quote is free, it commits you to nothing, and no payment is taken on this site.