The Ionian Islands take their name from the sea which lies between the tip of Italy and the west coast of Greece. The Ionians in turn took their name from Ion, after the nymph goddess of the sea. These islands are also known as the Eptanisos - The Seven Islands - of which Corfu is the second largest with a length of 40 miles and a width varying between two and a half and eighteen miles. The North East Cape, where you will find the resort town of Kassiopi, is one and a half miles from the Albanian coast. The shape of the island resembles a scythe with a surface area of 588 square miles.
Geologically speaking, Corfu is an off-shore peak of ranges belonging to the deformed belt of mountains which run through Yugoslavia and Western Greece. The oldest rocks of the Highlands are the Mesozoic limestone (about 135 million years old) which were crushed against the central core in the Tertiary era (about 75 million years ago) forming marls, silstones, and sandstone areas. The softer deposits have produced some beautiful caves and grottoes of which the best examples are on Paxos, an island south of Corfu.
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