Giresun Island

The fishing boat pitches through the Black Sea swell for twenty minutes before the island materialises — a dark hump of hazelnut trees and wild herbs rising from grey-green water. Giresun Island is small enough to walk around in an hour, quiet enough to hear the waves from every point, and old enough to hold the ruins of a temple where Amazons may have worshipped.

Giresun Island is the only island in the Turkish Black Sea, sitting roughly a kilometre and a half offshore from the city of Giresun. Ancient sources identify it as Aretias, the Island of Ares, where Jason and the Argonauts were said to have been attacked by flocks of bronze-feathered birds. Archaeological remains on the island include the foundations of a Byzantine monastery and an earlier Hellenistic temple, possibly dedicated to the war god. Each May, the island hosts the Aksu Festival, a centuries-old fertility celebration with roots in pre-Christian traditions, during which locals circle the island by boat and throw pebbles into the sea. The surrounding waters are rich in anchovy and hamsi, the fish that defines Black Sea cuisine.