Glyfades Wetland

Mount Ampelos, also known as “Karvounis,” spans the central and eastern parts of Samos and took its name from the extensive terraced vineyards that characterized the area. The highest peak is Prophet Elias, at 1,153 m, where a chapel of the same name stands. The mountain has gentle slopes and plateaus, and a few rocky areas along the ridges, and the summit can also be reached by road. Pine forests dominate, with Turkish pine at lower elevations and black pine higher up—a rare timber important in shipbuilding—covering about 15% of the island’s forest area. You also encounter cypresses, oaks, chestnuts, plane trees, poplars, and fruit trees such as walnuts, apple, pear and cherry. The flora is enriched with many aromatic plants and herbs—savory, oregano, thyme, sage, mountain tea—and distinctive species such as Samos’s wild orchid and saffron. The mountain is also famed for its wild edible mushrooms, “manites,” in varieties such as koumarenies, arkenies, silvomanites and piperanies. A large part of Ampelos has been included in the NATURA 2000 protected areas network, highlighting its importance for Samos’s biodiversity.