Panagia Tourliani Monastery

Panagia Tourliani Monastery tickets: which one to buy

Entry is free with a donation box inside, and a small museum of vestments and icons occupies a room off the courtyard. The monastery is in Ano Mera, the inland village about seven kilometres from Mykonos Town, reached by local bus for a couple of euros, by taxi or by hire car and quad, which is how most visitors on Mykonos get around. Island highlights tours include the monastery with the beaches and the lighthouse and cost a moderate amount.

There is no guide service on site. The village square outside has several tavernas and is one of the few places on Mykonos where prices resemble the rest of Greece. Nothing needs booking and the monastery is rarely crowded even in August. Buses from Mykonos Town run roughly every hour in season and much less often in winter, and the last one back leaves in the early evening.

Visiting Panagia Tourliani Monastery: what to see

Monks founded the monastery in 1542 and rebuilt it between 1757 and 1767 in the form it has now: a whitewashed complex around a courtyard, with a marble bell tower carved in Tinos and a facade of restrained baroque detail that reads as Venetian rather than Greek. The church holds an icon of the Virgin said to have been found floating off Tourlos beach, attributed by tradition to St Luke and covered in silver. The iconostasis was carved in Florence in 1775, painted and gilded, and is the single most elaborate object on the island.

Around the courtyard are the old monks' cells, a marble fountain and a small museum. The Dormition on 15 August is the great feast, celebrated with a procession and food for the whole village, and the icon is carried into Mykonos Town on the first Sunday of Lent. A marble fountain of 1806 stands in the courtyard and the old refectory has been turned into a room displaying vestments and silver votive offerings.

Panagia Tourliani Monastery opening hours and the best time to go

Open daily with a long break in the middle of the day, generally morning and late afternoon; hours shorten out of season and the monastery may be locked in winter, when Ano Mera has few visitors. Mykonos is at its busiest from July to early September, when the beaches and the town are full and Ano Mera is a relief. Dress code is enforced, with shoulders and knees covered and wraps provided at the door.

Photography inside the church is not allowed. Allow half an hour. The village is the centre of the island's farming, such as it is, and the bakery on the square sells the local cheese pies that are worth the trip on their own. Ano Mera's square is shaded by plane trees and is the one place on the island where a coffee costs what it does on the mainland.