The windmills at Chora on Patmos have been restored, initially by private initiative but now with some kind of grant. One of them is fully functional and is, apparently, used to mill wheat in the summer.
The furthest one has a bronze Russian double-eagle over the door. At first glance it looks like the Byzantine eagle used by the Greek Orthodox church in the Dodecanese but it differs in that it has a small crown above it, making it the emblem for the Russian royal family. Interesting.
Apart from the Korean and Croatian tourists mentioned previously we did not see a soul on our walk from the monastery across to the windmills and back to the car park. We did, however, see quite a few cats, of which more later.
Patmian architecture is very different to Symi’s. The houses are flat-roofed stone structures with small windows and quirky doors within doors. There are many tunnels across the lanes, supported by strong reeds and wooden beams to support the stone above. The flat roofs are also made of reeds, wood and plaster which may be covered with gravel as insulation. Walls are painted white and woodwork is in muted shades of grey, eau de nil and verdigris. Very elegant. I took more photographs on the Sunday morning so you still have those to look forward to.
After our morning explorations we then drove to the northern part of the island in search of a traditional wooden boat yard mentioned in a guidebook and met a lot of goats, but that is tomorrow’s instalment.
Adriana Shum 
We went looking for the traditional boat yard last June. We found it OK but, to say the least, not a lot there! Your comments about it being a very clean island with no litter are interesting, Adriana. That’s something we’ve noticed a lot this last few years. As well as Patmos, Lipsi is almost obsessive about re-cycling, Nyssiros is all but litter free and any that does appear is picked up by the cleansing team who seem to be on patrol constantly. Kalymnos is similarly very clean once you get away from Pothia as is Tilos and Astypalea. As well as being as obsessive as Lipsi, Agathonissi even has a local group who go out and clear things that shouldn’t be there from the water in the bay! Regretfully, the one island that seems to stand out in contrast is Symi where the litter situation doesn’t seem to have improved over the 20+ years we’ve been visiting.