Travel Guide Prophitis Ilias

Coming from the west coast, you pass Theologos beach before heading inland towards the village of Dimilia. Continuing into the heart of the island, you'll reach the ghost village of Eleoussa, abandoned at the end of the Fascist occupation. The village was founded by the Italians in 1935 to house a community of forest guards, mostly settlers from Trentino, charged with looking after the surrounding thorny forests. A stroll through Eleoussa offers a plunge into a bygone era, and you can't help but be touched by the strange atmosphere and old-world charm of the place.Beyond Eleoussa, the road forks at right-angles and rises to Mount Prophitis Ilias, 800 metres high. The fires of 2023 fortunately spared the dense forests in the immediate vicinity. Spend the night at the Hotel Elafos, built by the Italians in the late 1920s in the style of northern Italian chalets. If you can't sleep here, you can stop off for a coffee. Situated in a pine forest, cut off from the modern world and far from the epinal image associated with the Greek islands, you'll feel close to nature. Deer - the emblem of Rhodes - live wild in the forest. These fragile endemic species were affected by the terrible fires of July 2023: although Prophitis Ilias was spared, a large part of the forest where its animals reside went up in flames, devouring all the land as far as the south-east coast, between Lardos and Gennadi.