Rhodes town and Filerimos private tour (4 hours)

What fits in four hours?

Three stops within 15 kilometres of the port and 52 minutes of driving, routed on OpenStreetMap without traffic: 7 min and 3.9 km from the cruise quay to the acropolis of Rhodes on Monte Smith for 30 minutes; 19 min and 11.5 km to Filerimos hill for 45; 24 min and 14.6 km back to the Old Town for 90 minutes on foot; 2 min and 1.1 km to the quay. Twenty-three minutes are left loose for a slower lane or a longer view. From a hotel the first and the last leg follow the address. With five hours, the Lindos tour trades the two hills for the acropolis of Lindos; with eight, the full day has all of them.

Monte Smith: the ancient acropolis, free to enter

The acropolis of Hellenistic Rhodes stood on the western and highest part of the city, one of the few ancient citadels without walls, the Ministry’s portal says: the temple of Athena Polias and Zeus Polieus, the temple of Pythian Apollo, the Artemision, the stadium and the gymnasium, most of it of the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, with a small marble odeon rebuilt and the stadium set in greenery as an archaeological park. Admission is free, by the portal’s ticket line, with summer hours by period and free access from November to March. It is 35 minutes on foot from the Medieval City by the same portal, which is why it opens a driver’s day: 7 minutes from the quay, half an hour among the columns and the view, no gate to queue at.

Filerimos: the hill of ancient Ialysos

Twenty minutes by car from the city on the portal’s count, the hill holds the acropolis of ancient Ialysos, the oldest of the three Dorian cities of Rhodes: the temple of Athena Polias and Zeus Polieus, medieval remains, and the Monastery of Filerimos, which housed the Knights Hospitaller, passed to Franciscan monks and is an Orthodox church today, the site landscaped and restored by the Italians. To the right of it the path the portal calls the Way of Golgotha leads to a stone cross 16 metres high and a view over the north-west of the island; the path is beside the site, the ticket is the site’s. That ticket is 10 EUR (checked 14 Oct 2026, hh.gr), reduced 5 EUR (checked 14 Oct 2026, hh.gr), and the portal lists a café or restaurant, a shop, WC and accessibility. Forty-five minutes cover the site, the church and the walk to the cross. The hours, as the portal prints them on its Ialysos page:

• 1 Apr to 31 Aug: 08:00 to 20:00, last entry 19:40
• 1 Sep to 15 Sep: 08:00 to 19:30, last entry 19:10
• 16 Sep to 30 Sep: 08:00 to 19:00, last entry 18:40
• 1 Oct to 15 Oct: 08:00 to 18:30, last entry 18:10
• 16 Oct to 31 Oct: 08:00 to 18:00, last entry 17:40
• 1 Nov to 31 Mar: Monday, 08:30 to 15:30, last entry 15:10
• 1 Nov to 31 Mar: Wednesday, 08:30 to 15:30, last entry 15:10
• 1 Nov to 31 Mar: Thursday, 08:30 to 15:30, last entry 15:10
• 1 Nov to 31 Mar: Friday, 08:30 to 15:30, last entry 15:10
• 1 Nov to 31 Mar: Saturday, 08:30 to 15:30, last entry 15:10
• 1 Nov to 31 Mar: Sunday, 08:30 to 15:30, last entry 15:10

Checked 14 Oct 2026, hh.gr.

Ninety minutes in the Old Town

The driver leaves you at the edge of the walls and waits there with the vehicle. Ninety minutes hold the Street of the Knights and the Palace of the Grand Master at its top: the seat of the Order from the early 14th century, partly destroyed by an explosion in 1856, rebuilt by the Italians and a museum today, with two exhibitions on ancient and medieval Rhodes on the ground floor and mosaic floors from Kos upstairs, as the Ministry’s portal tells it. The ticket is 20 EUR (checked 14 Oct 2026, hh.gr), reduced 10 EUR (checked 14 Oct 2026, hh.gr); open daily until 20:00 from April to October, 08:30 to 15:30 with Tuesdays closed from November to March, last admission 20 minutes before closing; the portal lists a café or restaurant, a shop, WC, WiFi, an elevator and accessibility. The walk on the walls has its own ticket and opens only at midday on summer weekdays, so it rarely fits a morning tour; the Rhodes page prints the Palace’s full table.

Driver or licensed guide?

Filerimos and the Palace are Ministry sites, and inside them guiding is reserved to state-licensed guides by Law 5121/2024; Monte Smith, free and open, is a site too. Our driver drives, waits at each stop with the vehicle and gives practical orientation; a licensed guide for the Palace or the hill is booked ahead on request and quoted with the day. The driver-or-guide guide explains the rule.

Steps, shade, toilets and lunch

No meal stop in four hours; the 90 minutes in the Old Town leave room for a coffee or a plate at your own expense. Toilets are listed by the portal at Filerimos and the Palace, with a café or restaurant and a shop at both and an elevator at the Palace; it lists none at Monte Smith. Steps and shade no official page counts, so no figure is printed: the driver’s orientation at each stop covers where the vehicle waits, how far the walk is, where the steps, the shade and the nearest toilets are. Flat shoes for the paving of the Old Town, a hat and water for the two hills in summer.

What does it cost for our group?

The 4-hour rate card, per group: 300 EUR for up to three guests in a sedan, 400 EUR for four to seven in a minivan, 100 EUR a head for four and 67 EUR for six; from eight the rate is per person. Two tickets are paid at the gates, Filerimos and the Palace, printed above with their dates; Monte Smith has none. The site takes no payment: the office confirms by email, the driver is paid on the day.

Where do we meet the driver?

From a ship: at the passengers’ exit of the cruise terminal at the Tourist Port, with a sign with your name; the tour needs four hours plus the 90-minute margin before all-aboard, five and a half hours in port, printed on the card and checked by the form, and ends 2 minutes from the quay. From a hotel: at the door, anywhere on the island, and back to it. The cruise port page has the port’s facts with their sources, and the Rhodes page sets this tour beside the 5-hour and the 8-hour days.