A Greek Odyssey: Crete

Hi if you’re new here, this is part four of a two-week trip to Greece. If you missed them, catch up on parts one, two, and three.

day 9

To get to Crete from Santorini, we took another SeaJets ferry. We docked in Heraklion around 6p, the sun was setting around 7p, and we had a two-hour drive to our hotel in Chania, so we didn’t explore much on this day. But, that doesn’t mean we were short on adventures, as this was the one part of the trip where we rented a car rather than relying on public transportation. Once again grateful we stuck to carry on luggage, we rented a midsized, automatic transition car from Rental Center Crete. They had some of the best prices out there, were easy to find right there at the port in Heraklion, and were incredibly helpful with instructions on how to operate the car and where to drop it off in Chania at the end of the trip.

While I wouldn’t necessarily want to drive somewhere as busy as Athens, driving in Crete was honestly less scary than driving in Nashville. They drive on the right side of the road which I’m used to as an American, and all the signage was either English-enough, or self-explanatory symbols. One thing I was glad I had read about ahead of time, is that slow drivers tend to straddle the line between the lane and the shoulder to allow faster cars to pass. As both the passer and the passee throughout the trip, I felt comfortable doing both and drivers were not nearly as aggressive as I’ve seen in the States. There were some narrow, one-lane-but-two-way winding roads through the mountains, but it really wasn’t all that bad.

One of the most unique experiences we had on the whole trip was stopping for dinner at Makis Taverna in Panormos. As previously mentioned, I’ll get into the details of all the food for the whole trip in a separate post, but rather than having a traditional menu, the owner brought us back into his kitchen where he showed us all the food he had made that day, from which we then chose a few entrees and side dishes. The village itself looked so quaint and old-world, and reminded me more of the Italian countryside than I expected; such a change of scenery from the Clydalic islands.

We eventually made it to our hotel just outside Chania: The Tanneries Hotel & Spa. This was by far the fanciest hotel I’ve ever stayed in. We had a two-story room overlooking the sea. On the first floor, there was a huge bathroom with a jacuzzi tub, a mini bar, a king-sized bed, a living room, and a balcony. The upstairs had a second king-sized bedroom, mini bar, and bathroom with a shower and a steam room. The hotel also had an indoor heated pool and an outdoor not heated hot tub (confusing), but we never got the chance to use either since we were too busy being out and about. They welcomed us with a bottle of champagne and some gingerbread cookies, and they had a well-rounded breakfast buffet along with a full made-to-order breakfast menu included with the stay.

Day 10

After a failed attempts in both Paros and Santorini, we were determined to finally have a full beach day in Crete. One of the most famous beaches in Crete is Elafonissi Beach, known for its pink sand. It’s located about an hour and a half outside of Chania, so it took us awhile to get there. Most of the drive was long a coastal highway, but the second half was through narrow, winding roads through small mountain towns. One of my favorite parts about this drive was seeing all of the olive trees everywhere. I don’t just mean a grove here or there, but rather they were about as frequent as seeing a pine tree in the U.S.

To get to the beach, we had to pay to park on top of a hill about a half mile from the shore. There were some public restrooms with a kitty attendant, and further along the way there was a convenience store with bigger, cleaner restrooms for customers. By the time we got there, all the sun beds were sold out, but we found a shaded spot under a tree to toss our belongings, and I got to practice my German by asking the couple next to us if the water was warm or cold, and asking them to take our picture. The lady assured me the water was “not cold”, and while it was significantly warmer than the not-so-hot hot springs of Santorini, it was still chillier than I expected. That said, it was warm enough to spend a good chunk of the afternoon waist deep in by far the clearest water I’ve ever seen.

To be quite honest with you, the sand was barely pink. It was more noticeable in some areas than others, but most of it was regular, white sand. It supposedly gets more or less pink with the seasons and the tide, but given the people I saw ignoring signs not to remove the sand, I imagine tourists taking some home played a part as well. With or without the pink sand, it was definitely worth a visit and is officially my second favorite beach I’ve ever been to. (First place goes to Lanikai Beach in Hawaii.)

Wanting to avoid driving through the mountains in the dark, we left the beach late in the afternoon and stopped for dinner around sunset near the town of Kissamos. From the restaurant, we saw what looked to be a shipwreck, and after googling, learned that is in fact what we were looking at. We were surprised to learn that it just happened in 2022, as it looks like its been there for decades.

Day 11

Our goal for our last full day in Crete was to visit the towns of Rethymno and Chania. I found that they had very similar feels to each other, as they are both old Venetian harbor towns. The main distinction was that Rethymno also has an old fortress. We walked through the gate, but after seeing the long line of people waiting to see the actual fortress, we opted out since we were running short on time. Aside from the village of Lefkes in Paros, these two towns were my favorite places for just wandering aimlessly down all the side streets, taking in the architecture and street art. We were able to catch the sun setting over the harbor in Crete, and I have to admit it brought tears to my eyes knowing the sun was setting on the entirety of our trip.

to be continued…