Reeta Chakrabarti chooses Amorgos in Greece

Reeta Chakrabarti on Amorgos, Greece

The BBC newsreader reminisces about a family holiday haunt

Getting to Amorgos is not for the faint-hearted. You have to fly to Athens, and then take a ninehour ferry. The first time that we did it, we arrived exhausted in the middle of the night and I thought, ‘I’m not sure I’ll be doing this again.’ But then I woke up in the morning and the sky was a blue I’d never seen before, the water was so clear, the sand was golden. It sounds like a cliché, but it’s true.

We first went in 2010 with two other families, and we had such fun that we all went back for five years in a row. It’s a low-key, quiet, family-friendly island. It retains a very authentically Greek feeling because it’s not overdeveloped. It probably hasn’t changed all that much in the last 20 years.

The main town, Chora, is a maze of whitewashed sugarcube houses and has endless tavernas, a lovely seafront and lots of bijou shops selling wonderful jewellery and beach clothes. Inland, there are characterful hilltop villages that you can walk to, such as Lagada and Tholaria, where there’s a woman who does beautiful handmade jewellery. I occasionally get emails or tweets from women when I’m presenting the news, asking, ‘Where did you get those gorgeous earrings?’ ‘I’m afraid I got them in Greece!’

The beaches are mostly sandy, but there are a few pebbly ones with crystal-clear water. One of the most spectacular beaches is called Mouros and it’s brilliant for jumping off ledges into the sea. If we went there, my husband Paul and I knew we would enjoy two or three hours of peaceful reading because our three children would be clambering up the rocks and jumping back in.

I am a sun worshipper but, possibly because I’m Asian, I’m not a sunbather. We would do a great swim in the mornings – the Three Bays Swim – which became a little bit competitive in our group. I only swam to all three bays once, but others were much more macho about it!

It’s a mountainous island and there’s fabulous hiking to be done. The Greeks in our resort thought we were absolutely bonkers because we would set off on these walks mid-afternoon, when the sun was still beating down. You could just see them thinking, ‘Mad dogs and Englishmen’. I can’t say

every second was pleasurable, but it was always worth it.

There’s a superb five-hour hike called the Spine up the hilly centre of the island. It’s so remote – it’s just you, your companions and the hills. It’s also well worth climbing up to the stunning 11th-century monastery of Panagia Hozoviotissa, which seems to be growing out of a cliff face. Legend has it that the builders began to construct it on the seafront, but every night their work was mysteriously destroyed. One day, a tool bag was found hanging off a nail hammered into the rock high above their heads, and they believed it was a sign to build the monastery up there.

It’s been a few years since we’ve been to Amorgos, but we’ll definitely go back. When we do, I know we’ll slip back into the same routine: swimming, snorkelling, long lunches, walks, sociable dinners. I hope we’ll go back with the same people, because they’re part of the fun of it. My children are all grown-up now, but I hope they’ll come too.

Above Below Chakrabarti out hiking in 2012 – accompanied by a watchful goat. Tholaria town