About 220km (136mi) north of Asmara is what appears at first glance to be just a remote, high-altitude collection of iron shacks, but Nakfa is a lot more than that. During much of Eritrea's long fight for independence, Nakfa served as the headquarters of the country's resistance movement and so became one of the more popular spots for touring Ethiopian bombs and bullets. The town has since been rewarded by becoming, in the eyes of Eritreans, a symbol of their hard-fought-for independence - not to mention by having the country's currency named after it. A visit to Nakfa, which entails a fairly arduous road trip, will give you a better understanding of what took place on the country's battlefields and will also take you to the heart of the collective Eritrean self-determination.

During wartime, the Eritrean soldiers literally lay low by building underground towns where they could make weapons, print pro-independence literature and tend to their wounded without exposing themselves to the eyes of the Ethiopian military, and many of these underground facilities are still accessible. Near Nakfa are the twin peaks of Den Den, a mountain that served as the rebels' radio transmission 'tower' during the war and which provides clear views of the surrounding area and all its battle scars. The last building left standing in town during the worst of the Ethiopian bombardments was the Nakfa Mosque, still standing now and still wearing the hole that was blown in its cupola.

Floating off the coast of Eritrea are the 350-plus islands of the Dahlak Archipelago. Though over 20 of the flat chunks of mainly arid and barren land can be visited from the port of Massawa, it's not the islands themselves but what's around them that is the real highlight of this Red Sea grouping. The waters, relatively unpolluted because the local fishing industry drifted to a halt during the war, teem with dense fish and coral populations, providing visitors with an exceptional ecological treat. The area is littered with prime reef and wreck-diving sites and attracts rubber-suited individuals from far afield.

Dahlak Kebir is the largest island in the archipelago and harbours nine ethnic villages and a number of significant archaeological ruins of both islander and Arabian origin; in fact, the island is so full of significance that it may soon be declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Dahlak Kebir also has (some say unfortunately) a huge tourist hotel-casino complex. The island of Nokra once played host to a notorious Italian penitentiary and later to a Russian military base, and it's worth asking at the Massawa shipping office if a visit is possible. The best time to dive in the archipelago is July through August, when water visibility is not so impeded by algae and other natural visual obstacles.

Eritrea played a prime role in the dramas of the ancient Aksumite civilisation nearly 2000 years ago. The area around the small village of Metera, 20km (12.5mi) south of Qohaito, was particularly significant during this time because it was the location of a sizeable bourgeois, or middle-class, community - so big, in fact, that it's now the third-largest Aksumite historical site in the country. Some of the scattered ruins, first discovered by a wandering Frenchman in the late 1860s, were apparently established around the fifth century BC, pre-dating the rise of Aksum. Though there's already a long list of objects large and small that have been excavated at Metera, the vast majority of the site is still waiting to be dug up.

Metera's Stele - a stele being an upright stone column decorated with inscriptions - is the centrepiece of the excavation's ruined architecture. Standing 2.5m (8ft) tall, the stele was planted at the foot of Amba Saim hill and is a stand-out because of the pagan, pre-Christian symbol of the sun over the crescent moon that is carved at the top of the eastern face. Other archaeological discoveries at Metera include a royal palace or villa, a tomb chamber (curiously empty), and the remains of an underground tunnel that, according to local legend, once led several hundred kilometres south to Aksum.

Sweating away in the northern part of the inhospitable volcanic desert known as Dankalia, nearly 60km (37mi) south of Massawa, are the ancient Aksumite ruins of Adulis. First settled in the sixth century BC and thus the oldest site of civilisation in Eritrea, Adulis was the great port of the Aksumites and dealt with trade from the Mediterranean all the way to the Indian subcontinent. Although Adulis has a great historical resume, it tends to disappoint during a personal interview because nearly all of it (98%) is still hiding underground. But with patience, a large (over)dose of imagination and a local guide who can explain exactly what it is that's sticking up from the dirt and what's buried beneath it, visitors will avoid being disappointed.