The National Marine Park of Alonnisos Northern Sporades ranges over a wide sea area covering around 2.260 Km2, located at the northwest of the Aegean Sea, north of Evia and east of Pelion.

The park forms a unique combination of terrestrial and aquatic Mediterranean habitats. Hundreds of flora species as well as numerous animal and plant species are of significant scientific interest. Furthermore, the ruins, ageing back to various historical periods, increase the archaeological and historical significance of the area.

History

Alonnisos is a beautiful, peaceful island with many natural beauties. The island hosts the only Marine Park in Greece that specifically aims to protect the endangered monk seal Monachus monachus .

The island’s name is traced back to the first years of Greece’s liberation from the Ottoman Empire. In the ancient years, the island was called Ikos, while the Greeks probably called "Alonnisos" the neighbouring northern island, Kyra-Panagia.

The history of the island goes back to the Paleolithic Age, when it supposedly formed a single piece of land along with the rest of the Sporades islands and Thessaly. Tools and petrified bones from the Middle Stone Age have been found at Kokkinokastro on Alonnisos. These are possibly the oldest findings indicating human settlement in the Aegean. Signs of a New Stone Age settlement have been discovered in the bay of Agios Petros on the island of Kyra Panagia.

Tradition has it that, during the 16th century B.C., the Minoan Rule period in the Aegean Sea, the Cretes under the leadership of the mythic hero Stafylos built settlements in Peparithos (the contemporary Skopelos) and in Ikos. It was then that the cultivation of olives and vineyards in the island began. In the coming years, the Minoan colony acquired a Mycenaean character. The Mycenaean city is located today at Kokkinokastro, on the east side of the island.

At the end of the Mycenaean era, Achilles’ father, Pileas, came to the island and lived there until his last days; according to tradition he was buried on the island.

In 476 B.C., the island acceded to the Athenian Alliance. During the classic period, Ikos had two cities (in the 5th century, Skylax, the geographer, refers to the island as "Dipolis" - "two-cities"). The one was situated at Kokkinokastro, where ruins of the wall still stand, and the other one at the location where the contemporary Chorio or Old Alonnisos is built.

During that period, the island was famous for its vineyards and its exquisite wine, which was exported inside amphorae, whose handle bore the inscription IKION. The geographical location of the island was at that time very important, a fact attested by the plethora of ancient shipwrecks found in the area.

In 190 B.C., the Roman fleet occupied the island. Henceforth, no further information is found on the history of Ikos. When the Latin crusaders seized Constantinople in 1204, Alonnisos and its neighbouring islands came under the occupation of West-European knights. From then on, Skopelos and Alonnisos formed a feud of alternate conquerors.

Following the occupation of Constantinople by the Turks, in 1453, the islands came under the Venetian possession until 1538, when the Turkish armada, under the leadership of Hairedin Barbarossa, imposed Turkish rule. During the Greek Revolution of 1821 and the first years of the Hellenic Nation’s liberation, many Greeks from all over Greece found refuge on the island and along with its natives formed the composition of the contemporary population of Alonnisos.

The Chora of Alonnisos, which used to be the island’s capital, suffered total disaster from a big earthquake. The inhabitants of the island lived in tents for about two years, and then most of them settled in Patitiri, today’s capital of the island.

Traditional Festivities And Cultural Events

In Alonnisos, traditional weddings, a custom preserved until today, are of particular interest. The wedding starts when the best man, accompanied by musicians, leaves his house and walks towards the house of the groom. The groom, after giving money and treating the musicians with traditional sweets, tsipouro or wine, takes to the house of the bride. He finds the door closed and must promise his mother-in-law a gift. When the door opens, he steps on shoddy for good luck and all together as a group walk to the church. The bride wears a traditional wedding dress called "the morka". After the ceremony, goat with red sauce and spaghetti is served and everybody dances till morning. The revival of the traditional wedding takes place on the fifteenth of August.

The patron saint of the island is Agia (Saint) Paraskevi. Each year on the 26th of July, the picture of the saint goes around the island and many popular festivities accompany the spiritual celebrations.

During the last years, the Municipality of Alonnisos organizes with great success the KALOGIANNIA, track races with the participation of athletes from Northern Sporades.