The Northeast Coast
On the east shore south of cape Artemision, below the village of Ellinika, is the small harbour and promontory of Aghios Nikolaos (40km). This is probably the site of Ancient Helleniko—where some of the Greek fleet may have provisioned before the Battle of Cape Artemision. The enclosed bay looks across to the Pelion peninsula and Skiathos, with the little islet and chapel of Aghios Nikolaos just off-shore. The ancient settlement was to the east side, and evidence shows that the headland was fortified. A number of ancient architrave and other blocks have been collected in the field beside the low saddle of the promontory.
The wealth of surface finds scattered over this whole stretch of the northeast edge of the island suggests that there was an extensive network of forts and settlements protecting and surveying the important sea passages through these waters, especially from Archaic to Hellenistic times.
South from Ellenika the landscape becomes steeper and more densely forested. There are fine beaches below Vasilika (46km), and east of Aghia Anna (67km) where a road leads down to the long, sandy bay at Agali. The north end of the bay is sheltered by the promontory of Aghios Vasilios where the remains of ancient fortification have been tentatively identified as belonging to the ancient town of Trychas. The area to the northwest of Aghia Anna, stretching as far as Kerasia and beyond it to the west, is the location of a fossilised forest dating from the Upper Miocene era, 10–25 million years ago—a period when a continuous land mass connected this area to Anatolia. It has yielded significant evidence of early fauna: examples of early ungulates, both Perissodactyla (elements of the skulls of rhinoceri bearing two horns) and of Artiodactyla (such as a kind of short-necked giraffe) are attested.
Euboea Island, Greece