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Crete’s Coast & Mountains

• self-guided inn-to-inn walking route • grade 3 • one of our most rewarding coastal walks • spectacular terrain, stunning views • learn about the island’s history

Crete offers quite magnificent coastal walking, some of the very best you will experience in Greece, and to discover the island on foot is a rare privilege. Full of cultural interest, this holiday takes you around western Crete, passing through Aiolos, homeland of the god of the winds; the pirate country of Gramvoussa; and Elafonisi, land of the Cyclops according to a Homeric legend. You enjoy rewarding, sometimes full, days of walking across rugged countryside and stay in simple, welcoming hotels and pensions.

Grade: 3
Terrain: Mountains, gorges, coastal trails
Climate: Long, hot summer; warm spring & autumn
Nights: 7
Starting point: Kastelli (2*)
Day 1: 10, 16 or 19km optional walk from Kastelli (2*, B&B)
Day 2: 20km to Kambos (inn)
Day 3: 16km to Paleochora (2*)
Day 4: 8 or 19km optional walk from Paleochora (2*, B&B)
Day 5: 20km to Souyia (2* apartments, B&B)
Day 6: 14km optional walk from Souyia (2* apartments, B&B)
Please note that the hotels have no official classification; star ratings are our own

In the footsteps of the Gods

Your holiday begins with two nights in bustling, workaday Kastelli at the Christina Beach Hotel, a well-located, family-run small hotel with a pool and spacious bedrooms. We include your first dinner at a taverna by the beach and offer a choice of walks taking in the ancient city of Falassarna (return by bus - pay locally), the rugged slopes of Mount Prophet Ilias, or the remote but beautiful Gramvoussa Peninsula (pay locally for a taxi to the start). Leaving Kastelli, you head through silent mountains to Kambos, where you are greeted by Lefteris Chartzoulakis, ebullient owner of the village’s simple, traditional pension offering basic rooms and country cooking.

Narrow gorges and ancient ruins

The next day, you are transferred to Elafonisi, from where you walk around the island’s south-western tip and past the ruins of the city of Vienna on one of Greece’s most picturesque coastal paths. Dinner is included on your first night at the welcoming Tsatsaronakis family’s Hotel Megim, with a transfer into nearby Paleochora for your other evening. Choose between two walks around Paleochora, both of which reveal a landscape of narrow gorges and mountains rising almost sheer from the sea. Your final destination is the fishing village of Souyia, at the end of another superlative day’s walking that begins along the coast then heads past the ancient ruins of Lissos and through a wild gorge. At Souyia, you stay two nights in comfortable apartments (with breakfast included at a café on the waterfront), enabling you to enjoy one final, fittingly dramatic walk that starts with a short bus journey (pay locally) then descends through the amazing Irini Gorge back to Souyia.

14-night itinerary

We know so many paths that we also offer a fortnight-long holiday on Crete. It starts with four nights in Kastelli so that you can enjoy all three walks, after which you have two nights in Kambos, giving you time to explore the gorge to the north, followed by three nights in Paleochora, where again you can walk both our routes. A third night in Souyia gives you a day to visit Lissos in more detail before being taken by taxi to the Amphora, a delightful hotel of 3-star standard in the city of Chania, a magical place to spend the last two nights of your discovery of the very best of Crete.

Prices & travel 2008

All prices in £ per person based on 2 people travelling together and sharing a double/twin room

#8-night holiday with a night in Athens on outward journey
Start: Tuesday with Air Direct or any day via Athens
Nights: 7
Meals: breakfast every day, dinner on 3 nights, plus 3 picnics. (4 dinners & 4 picnics on 14-night holiday)
Single Room: £87 for 7-night holiday; £212 for 14-night holiday; add £29 for single room in Athens
Air Direct Includes: charter flight Gatwick-Chania (please call for details and timings)
Air Via Athens Includes: Olympic Airways Heathrow-Athens (out dep 1220/arr 1755, home dep 1330/arr 1530), Olympic Airways Athens-Chania (out dep 1235/arr 1335; home dep 1025/arr 1120)

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