These four islands near the mainland are enlivened each summer by tourists in quest of their sand, monasteries, little fishing ports and villages with shady, narrow streets. Skiathos has long been the most popular, Skopelos is the most fertile, Alonissos with its pine-planted hills is calmer, as is Skiros, the most secret and detached of the archipelago. Sporades means “scattered”, a reference to its northern part (comprising of three islands and countless islets).