Mytilini (also spelled Mytilene) is the capital and main port of Lesbos, the third-largest Greek island, sitting close enough to the Turkish coast that on a clear day you can see the hills of Anatolia from the waterfront. The city wraps around two ancient harbours divided by a rocky headland topped by a Byzantine-Genoese castle, and the view arriving by ferry — castle above, neoclassical facades along the promenade, a dome and bell tower catching the light — is one of the better arrivals in the Aegean.
The place carries a remarkable amount of history lightly. Sappho and Alcaeus wrote their poetry here in the 6th century BC; Aristotle spent time on the island and called Mytilene the finest city in the world; the Ottoman conquest of 1462 left a quarter of old mosques and hammams that still stand in the market district. Two world-class museums — the Theophilos Museum celebrating a self-taught 19th-century folk painter, and the Museum of Tériade with original Matisse and Chagall lithographs — sit side by side in the Varia suburb, the improbable result of one Mytilene-born art publisher's Paris career.
But the city's most visible identity is built around ouzo. Lesbos produces roughly half of Greece's supply, and the waterfront ouzeries on the south harbour promenade are where you understand what the drink is supposed to be: a small carafe, a little cold water, and a succession of mezedes in no particular hurry. The harbour fills and empties with ferries from Athens and inter-island services; the market quarter behind it has the slightly chaotic energy of a working Greek port town. Mytilini is an easy base for exploring the whole island — the KTEL buses spread out from here, and car rentals are straightforward.
Lesbos has also been a significant point of arrival for refugees crossing from Turkey; the camps around the city are part of its recent reality, though they don't intrude on the town itself.