Mykonos, Greece

Mykonos Town was built as a maze on purpose. The lanes are narrow, white and deliberately confusing — a defence against pirates who, the theory goes, would lose their way before they could carry anything back to the harbour. It works well enough on visitors that getting lost is the expected experience rather than a failure.

Delos is the reason to take an excursion rather than stay in town. It is an uninhabited island 30 minutes away that was one of the most important religious sites in the ancient Greek world, birthplace of Apollo in myth, and at its height a city of perhaps 25,000 people. What survives is an entire abandoned town — houses with mosaics, a theatre, and the row of marble lions.

It is also unshaded, uneven and closed in bad weather, and boats stop running if the meltemi is up. For a group it needs a contingency plan.

Mykonos is expensive by Greek standards and openly so — beach club loungers in August cost what a meal does elsewhere. It is also among the most relaxed and welcoming islands in the Aegean, with a long-established reputation as a destination for LGBTQ+ travellers.

Hot and dry, 27–30°C in midsummer, with the meltemi wind blowing hard through July and August. The wind is why the island is covered in windmills, and why the occasional tender call is cancelled.