Apps: Ulmon maps
Guidebook: Rick Steves, Ulmon map app
Lodging: Airbnb Oia, Vranas Studios Chania
This was one of my huge bucket list trips that I wanted to do while we live here in Europe. Luckily, Ryan was able to get the leave so we could take a big chunk of time and explore both Crete and Santorini. We flew Ryan Air from Frankfurt Hahn to Chania Crete. These flights through Ryanair are cheap and seasonal starting in late April and run through about September. We opted for early May since the Gorge in Crete opens about that time, and that was one thing we wanted to hike while we were there. Crete has a great bus system, which we used for our entire stay on the island. The airport has buses that take you to Chania's main station. From here we were able to walk to our hotel very easily. If you will be in Crete for a while, it could make sense to rent a car, but to hike the Samaria Gorge, you will only be able to take public transportation. More on that later! Since this trip was a week long, I decided to break it down by day, so that you can see a typical itinerary and how we organized seeing the sites and getting around!
Day 1: From the airport we took a bus to Chania Main Bus Station and connected to a 2.5 hour bus to Heraklion. We stayed the night at Irini Hotel (booking.com) near the port so we could walk to the Ferry the next morning. We had plenty of time to walk around Heraklion's old town, have a nice Greek meal complete with Ouzo, have a fish foot spa, and check out the port and Venetian ruins.
Heraklion
fish spa
Day 2: We woke up early and walked to the ferry port. We found Hellenic Seaways signs and followed until we saw our boat. We lined up and waited for them to usher us onto the boat. This 2 hour high speed ferry took us from Heraklion to Santorini. You can find out more about the ferry by going to this site: http://www.ferries.gr/hfd/ We wanted to get around Santorini and explore the island, so we rented a car for 3 days from Santorini Car rental. They met us at the port with the car and we were on our way! We booked an airbnb in Oia, so after getting gas in the rental we headed out to find our place. We found a free parking lot and walked into the Old town of Oia and easily found Marco's Rooms. We are pretty low maintenance when it comes to lodging. As long as its clean, dry, in a good location, and relatively inexpensive we are happy campers. I will say this place has great hosts, great location, amazing sunset, breakfast, and clean rooms. Don't expect the Hilton if you choose to stay here and realize that its' an over 100 year old building, so it may be a little behind the times, but did have WIFI. Once we checked in, we walked up the street and hit the main pedestrian street in Oia. We explored the shops and meandered down the huge donkey hill to Amoudi Bay. We took in the views here and rode the donkey's back up to the village. I wasn't expecting an exhilarating ride on a donkey, but I have to admit at times I was really scared. We had heard that Santorini had great and unique wine so we set out to our first winery, Signals, to have a tasting and take in the vineyard views. We highly recommend this cute and friendly winery. We thoroughly enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere and the amazing wine. After a lovely evening of wine tasting, we went back to Oia to freshen up and get ready for the sunset and our dinner reservation at Roka Tavern. Our airbnb had an awesome Terrace, where we sat and had a coffee and watched the sun go down. That was a huge perk to where stayed. We walked to our restaurant, and from here you also have an amazing sea view, sunset, and can enjoy delicious food and service. The chocolate souffle was amazing even though it wasn't quite a Greek delicacy.
Hellenic Seaways Ferry to Santorini
Getting our rental car
part of our terrance
Door to our room
View from our terrace
our terrance
our B&B
Oia Castle Ruins
Our donkeys
Octopus
Yellow Donkey
Sigalas Winery
Sunset on our Terrace
Day 3: The next morning we drove to Fira. We found parking easily and walked the cliff side paths into the center of town. Fira is a cute town and also a town where you can ride donkeys up and down the cliffs if you have an interest in that. We spent time checking out shops, churches, and exploring all the tiny streets and views. After a few hours of exploring we drove the Red Beach. There is a 5-10 rocky walk to the beach from the parking area. It was an exceptionally beautiful beach and so different with the red sand and red cliffs. You can't visit a beach and not lay out and take in the sunshine for a while. A little sidetone, it cracks me up the people that come to a beach in heels! And how did they do the 10 minute hike to the beach in those things! I was struggling in flip flops and thought that was a dumb idea. Any who, after some beach time we drove to a black sand beach called Perissa Beach for more beach time and lunch. We found a yummy gyro place and scared that down before resting for a few more hours on the beach. I will say going in May, the water is not super warm, but the beaches are warm enough to lay out and we practically had the whole place to ourselves! No crowds for us! After lots of beaching, it was time to do some more wine tasting. I had researched various wineries on the island, and we opted for Boutari wines for our first stop on this day. It was a great little tasting room with friendly people, and amazing wine. This winery is a large Greek winery that produces wine all over Greece, so we were able to taste wines from several Greek regions. Our last stop was Santo Wines. If anything go to this place for the view. You will have an amazing view of the Caldera, which I have heard is incredible at sunset too. We shared a tasting here, and weren't terribly impressed with the wine, but it was good and the views to die for. We wanted to make it back to OIa to see the beloved sunset and it was so worth it! People flock to the Castle and cliffs to watch the sun go down, so it did get a little crowded here. We watched the sunset for a while but stayed back and scurried off to dinner before the crowds started to swarm the village! Of course we went back to Roka, because we liked it so much.
Fira
Skaro Rock and Oia in the distance
Fira
Red Beach
Red Beach
Santo Winery
Oia Sunset
Day 4: Day 4 started with a drive to Imerovigli to hike Skaro’s Rock. This area was so pretty so we spent over an hour exploring and taking in the views. After a little morning exercise we drove to Pyrgos- apparently the highest point on the island of Santorini. This town is also adorable, has donkeys, and great views. We found a place called Frank's Cafe and sat down to have a snack, bask in the sun, and take in some views. Then it was time for more wine tasting. We drove through the beautiful countryside and farms to Gaia Winery. This winery is positioned on a black sand beach and had delicious wines that went home with us. Next to Gaia was Kamari beach, a popular black sand beach in the area. We walked the boardwalk and laid on the beach for a few hours. We didnt leave Santorini without having some Red Donkey beer and great Greek food. We drove our car back to the port and sat had a new Santorini beer called Volcano before we had to board the ferry and head back to Crete. We arrived in Heraklion, walked across the street to the bus stationed, and boarded a bus back to Chania. This bus didnt get back to Chania until 11:00 pm, but we were able to walk 5 minutes to our hotel, Vranas Studios and check in with no problem.
Skaro Rock
Getting ready to hike
View of the Caldera
Monastery on Skaro
Pyrgos
Pyrgos View
Gaia Wine Tasting
Kamari Beach
Perissa Beach
Day 5: Chania is such a gem and since it has Venetian roots, it really reminds me of those cute streets in Venice. We spent the day getting lost in the cute small streets of the Old Town, stopping to eat and drink along the way. New Chora beach is really close to the Old town and a small but nice beach to relax on for a while. Ryan really wanted to get a massage on this trip, so I booked us a couples turkish massage at a small spa in Old Town Chania. It was great to stop from site seeing and just relax with my hubby for a while! I get so caught up in seeing all that we can, that I need his balance in my life! That night, we ate the dinner across from our hotel called Tholos. You cannot go wrong with Greek Salad, Eggplants, and Greek wine! It was absolutely amazing food, atmosphere, and service.
Day 6: In the morning we took a bus from the Chania main station to Kissimos. Here you buy Ferry tickets and ferry to Gramvousa Island and Balos Lagoon. I will admit, this was the roughest boat ride I have ever been on. I did enjoy that lunch was provided on the boat and they went all out! Talk about Greek BBQ, kebobs, greek salads, stuffed peppers and more! We explored the Venetitan Castle ruins on the island, walked the beach, and boarded the boat to eat before we docked at Balos Lagoon. This is probably the prettiest beach we have ever seen. The views were insane, the water warm, shallow, and aqua. The sand was fine, white, and pink. Its hard to describe, but it was gorgeous! The ferry took us back to Kissimos, we boarded a bus back to Chania and enjoyed yet another lovely Greek dinner.
Ferry from Kissimos to Balos
Gramvousa Island
Gramvousa Island Venetian Castle
Balos is hiding back there!
Pretty Pink Sand
Me and my sweetie!
Ryan chasing fishies!
Day 7: The Samaria Gorge is a must if you are spry and able hike. The good news is one way it is primarily downhill. Getting there and back is really the headache of day trip so here is what we did step by step. We picked up a bus schedule at information in the Chania Bus Station. This really helped us plan our day trips and getting around the island from Chania as our base. We took the early morning bus for about an hour to Omalos. A word of advice, be sure to buy a roundtrip ticket- one way to Omalos and a return to Chania Station from Hora Sfakion. The bus dropped us off at the entrance to Samaria Gorge where we bought our entrance tickets and started our hike. The hike will take you a minimum of 4 hours but if you want to stop and smell the roses along the way plan on 5-6 hours to make the trek. In our case, about mile 3 it started pouring rain. It let up a few times, but needless to say we were drenched from head to toe for the remainder of the hike. We had packed towels with the intention of swimming in the ocean at the end of the hike, but even our towels were getting wet through our backpacks. It was not an ideal hike, but it was still gorgeous and I am glad we did it. Once we reached Agia Roumeli, we found a restaurant so we could eat and warm up. The tourist shops made bank that day with all the hikers buying new shirts, towels, flip flops and anything warm and dry. From Agia Roumeli you buy a ferry ticket to Hora Sfakion. Once you get off the ferry in Hora Sfakion you follow the crowds to the lines of buses there waiting to take you back to Chania. We arrived back to Chania around 9:30 or 10:00 pm that evening. It was time to pack up and get ready to head home the next morning.
Warming up after a long rainy hike
Agia Roumeli - our reward after the hike
Getting ready to board the ferry for Hora Sfakion
Day 8: Our last morning we took a bus from Chania to the Airport and flew back to Frankfurt Hahn.
It was sad to say goodbye to Greece. I really love that dreamy place, and even Ryan found it to be one of his favorite Euro spots. If you have more time in Crete try a day trip to Elafonissi beach or Knossos ancient ruins near Heraklion.
For more up to date bus schedules in Crete follow this link: http://bus-service-crete.com/
