Overview

The small town of Thassos (or Limenas, as it is called by the Thassians) is build in the recess of a gulf, between capes Evreokastro to the east and Pachi to the west.

Limenas is the administrative and commercial center of Thassos. There are many hotels here, restaurants, tourist and other kinds of shops, banks, the customhouse, the police, phone company and post office buildings and the bus station. The town of Thassos also presents a great interest from an archeological point of view, so much for the remaining ruins that were unearthed, as for the rich findings that are exhibited in it';s museum.

The houses are build in a peculiar architectural setting: the most typical example is the fact that you have to take a rather strange route to get to down town, which is where the old and the new ports are. The ports stretch across a verdurous flat plain. The center of all motion is the central plaza that opens widely in front of the port, where traffic is always heavy, as there dock all the ferries coming from Keramoti (5.6 n.m.) and Kavala (16 n.m.). Here lies the classical two-storied building of the Town Hall.

Moving towards the interior of Limenas, we reach the central plaza, where lie the ruins of a old Christian basilica and close to that, remains from a mosaic from a 2nd century A.D. dwelling. The great three-dome basilica, probably build around the 6th century, in accordance with the architectural patterns of the basilicas in Constantinople, was founded on the ruins of an ancient roman settlement, to which belonged the dwelling with the part of the mosaic that was found, to the east of the Holy Sanctum';s arch.

On the east side of the plaza rises a mansion of the 19th century with enwalled glyph signs.

For years now Limenas leads the race of tourist development. Mostly because of it';s archeological wealth and the natural beauty of the area (it was one of the few areas of the island that remained unharmed from the great fires of 1985, 1989 and 1993  that scorched the entire island). Still, a great wound in the natural beauty of the area are the mining holes from the many marble quarries. At some point the people of the island will have to choose between tourist development and the insensible exploitation of the island';s underground, for those two cannot coexist for ever.