Crete - April 22-24
We catch a taxi to the city centre, hire a car and drive to Heraklion, the capital, and where we will be catching the ferry out of in 3 days for Santorini. On the way we stop at Melitos, a traditional fishing village and have lunch on the water. Beck and Louise walk around the tourist area of eraklion and find us rooms in a pension. The manager recommends a restaurant where we can get authentic Cretan food, wich is wonderful. It is Greek Easter and there are parades happening at the churches around the restaurant at 11pm. We go to watch some - fireworks, burning effigies of Judas and people in a candlelight procession. Unusual ending to the night.
On the 23rd we drive off after breakfast, get a bit lost and come across a lovely little viallge called Agios Milaos, high up on a ridge overlooking olive tree groves. We stop at a coffe shop, which in a small Greek village means lots of older men in conservative dress talking about the harvest. We sit on the balcony, drink Greek coffee and watch the fields. The men at the next table speak English, one of them lived in Australia for a while. Its 11am and they are already drinking ouzo (well, it is easter). They buy us a round which we have with the Easter cheese pastries that the man at the bakery gave us. A lovely start to the exploration of the island.
We drive to Zaros in the centre of the island, through brown and green countryside. There is a small lake in the nentre which is used as a trout farm. We buy a trout which a restaurant next to the lake bbqs and have lunch with a slad on the edge of the lake. We continue to the south of the island where Agios Paros and Triopetra make a windy, sunny point with a view along the rocky cliffs of the coast where steep dunes of brown sand lead to secluded beaches. At Milatos, which hippies took over in the 60s and lived in the Roman tomb caves in the cliffs. Unusual walking into dozens of caves dug into the cliffs over 1000 years ago, which 50 years ago held a commune of westerners escaping from society. Hersonissos is a very Surfers Paradise touriwst area - kitchy, pricey reaturants on the water under high rise apartments full of English holidaymakers. We do a big grocery shop, ead back to te pension in Heraklion which we get to at 11pm and have a late dinner before bed.
I leave early the next morining to retuun the car to Sitia, 2.5 hours away. As its a public holiday, the buses back to Heraklion dont go very often and I dont get back until 3pm. Beck and Louise ave visited te historic site of Knossos where the Minoans had there main centre.We walk to the ferry terminal to find the best way to get there as we leave the next mroning for Santorini and buy our tickets for there. I cook dinner and we eat on the balcony in Louises room. We get up early the next morning, walk to the ferry terminal and get on the catamaran for Santorini.
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