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Matala in Crete
Hotels and apartments
A place saturated in history. The town of Matala in
ancient times was the second most important of the Minoans. It is
just over one and a half hour’s drive from Heraklion and only
10 km from the famous and atmospheric Minoan site of Phaistos.
Many hundreds of years after the destruction of Phaistos,
Matala became the Roman harbour for the town of Gortys. Today, a beautiful
300 metre half crescent shaped sandy beach is protected on both sides
with great cliffs forming a pretty little bay. In the 60’s and
the 70’s Matala became renowned as hippies came from around
the world to live in the caves carved out of the cliff sides of the
bay.
These famous Stone age caves, are now undergoing archaeological
research and so spending a night in cases is not an option! About
2 km from Matala, lies the beautiful long open sandy beach of Komos
with its crystal clear water, where visitors will find only the smaller
of hotels, pensions, tavernas and shops.
There is much to explore in the surrounding area. Apart
from the second largest Minoan Palace of Phaistos, there is the Minoan
Palace of Agia Triada, the famous ancient Roman capital of Gortys,
the tiny village of Vori with its ethnological Museum, the mountain
villages of Kamares and Zaros with their countless natural springs,
and much much more
Hotels & apartments in Matala
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| Address in France: 20, Boulevard Joseph Garnier
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| Address in Greece: Astrikas - Chania - Crete |
Samaria gorge. Crete, Greece
Having a total length of sixteen kilometres, this gorge is the largest in Europe and certainly the most famous and visited among the many gorges of Crete.
Until about the middle of the century it was a wild landscape with a totally undisturbed ecosystem and home to a great number of wild birds and mammals as well as to a small population of woodcutters and shepherds who lived in Agia Roumeli or in the village of Samaria inside the gorge.
Today this village has been abandoned, but the steep slopes of the gorge and the thick forests in the surrounding area are still populated with many rare species. These include over fifty species of wild birds - among them, the extremely rare harrier eagle (Gypaetus barbatus) and golden eagle (Aquila Chrysaetos), both threatened with extinction - and about ten species of mammals among which the famous Cretan wild goat otherwise known as kri kri and the Cretan polecat known as zourìdha. As for the flora of the area, it is abundantly rich and includes many wild flowers native to this land.
In 1962, the gorge, together with a small area to the west and east of it, was officially declared a National Park, so that its delicate ecosystem could be protected.
The park extends over an area of 5100 hectares and, unlikeits quiet days in the past, today it is visited by some 300,000 people a year, all of them determined to walk the gorge. Visits are allowed between May and October, but in July and August the tourists are so many that it is impossible to be alone even for a minute. On the other hand, if you can come between May and early June, or between the middle of September and the end of October, you will certainly enjoy it a lot more.
A good time to visit the gorge (in fact, a time before it is officially opened to the public) is the first weekend of April, when a two-day festival is held in Samaria in honour of Osia Maria. The liturgy in the small Byzantine church is chanted by father Giorgis Chiotakis of Sfakia, an amazing priest who likes a good feast as much as anyone else and yet is a truly holy man.
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