Crete--where do we spend our time?
 

My college age son and I are going to Greece in early May. He is interested in history. Plan to do 2-3 day tour of Pelopennese and 2-3 days in Crete. How would you spend the time in Crete. Iraklio, Rethymno, Hania? How difficult is the Gorge--stairs to climb? Rough terrain constantly? Slippery and wet? <BR>Would appreciate your comments and help. <BR>Sheryl

There are many gorges in SW Crete. The most visited, Samaria, is not especially difficult, but you do need to step from rock to rock, which I find a little nerve wracking. If interested in ancient history, there are many other important archeological sites besides the one in Heraklion. Unfortunately I did not see them. My classical archeologist friend recommends the Blue Guide for info on visiting places of archeological interest. Chania is a charming city with an interesting mix of cultural influences, e.g., Turkish, Venetian, and even some casually ignored Mimoan ruins.

I meant Minoan, obviously. (Terrible typist.)

any into for her?

I'm surprised you haven't had a few more responses to this question. I'm not an expert and I'm not really into history that much, but I can say that our visit to Knossos, supposedly the most important site on Crete was highly disappointing. It was a mob of tours, and primarily everything there is concrete "reconstructions" of what maybe things looked like as there is very little factual information for them to follow. <BR>On the other hand the hike through the Samarian Gorge was the highlight of our week on Crete. The bus takes you to the top of the gorge and it is a very long way down at the beginning with hundreds, no, make that thousands of "steps" -- but they are down, not up. The rest of the trip is much easier. I suppose if it were wet it could be a little slippery, but not what I'd call dangerous. We chose to book a "package" that provides the bus to the gorge, you do the entire day on your own, then meet at the boat at the end of the gorge that takes you to another town where there is a road, and a bus trip back to Chania. Our favorite town was Chania, by the way, but we didn't get to Rethymno. Iraklio has quite an archeology museum, but not much else. We spent the week driving almost the entire island. The far east end was interesting, the south coast was mainly package tourism spots, and the center was generally quite green and interesting. We found the entire island the most "scenic" of the seven Greek islands we've been to, with the exception of the caldera area only of Santorini.