S
erifos. Nope, I hadn’t heard of it either. In fact, I am yet to get a glimmer of
recognition from anyone to whom I mention its name. I was introduced to
this small Greek island in the Cyclades by Elena Papanicolaou, a selfstyled travel designer who quit a busy corporate life to set up a small
agency delivering bespoke trips within Greece. Exclusive private houses,
yachts, cooks, cars, hotels, guides – you name it, she can organise it,
tailoring elaborate itineraries for those who want the undeliverable
delivered or who want the pain of organisation extinguished from their
holidays. I had asked her to recommend an island that was wild and
unknown (particularly to the British market), which still felt authentically Greek and where
tourism had made barely a footprint. And thus I encountered Serifos.