Agios Efstratios (also Ai Stratis in Greek) is a small island among the North-East Aegean islands south of Lemnos, with one village and a few hundred inhabitants. For much of the 20th century it was a place of political internment: from the 1920s to the 1960s thousands of opponents were exiled here, especially communists and left-wingers, including well-known writers and poets.
In 1968 an earthquake destroyed most of the village, which was rebuilt with prefabricated buildings that still contrast with the few traditional houses surviving on the hill. Today the island draws those seeking solitude: the beaches, such as long, sandy Alonitsi, Lidario and Agios Antonios, are almost always deserted and are reached on foot or by boat.
Getting there
Ships on the Lavrio-Lemnos-Kavala line call a few times a week; there is also a small link with Lemnos. There is no airport.
See also Lemnos and 20th-century Greece.