Crete Travel Guide
Filomathia Greek Language School offers Modern Greek language courses for foreigners who live or visit Chania or Crete island in Greece. For information about greek language courses and current courses offers you can visit website of the school.
Lessons via Skype are now available at Filomathia Greek Language School and are offered throughout the year. You can enjoy online Greek language courses without leaving the comfort of your home.
We are pleased to announce the new entry of "Retreat Village" to Crete TOURnet Hotel Directory.They are ideal for families and friends who would like to holiday together, but still maintain their private space.
Accommodation comprises nine villas with a mix of double bedrooms, twin rooms, single bedrooms and a few with bunk beds.
The villas can comfortably sleep 4 or 5 guests, and in most cases an additional sofa bed can be utilised in the living area.
All villa kitchens are fully equipped with with cooker, hob, microwave, fridge/freezer, all have washing machines, iron & ironing board, as standard.
The living rooms contain a lounge sofa and chairs, some in traditional style. All have their own individuality. Stone fireplace are present in 3 of the villas. Coffee tables and satellite TV are included. WiFi internet is being installed in each villa.
All villas benefit from air-conditioning and room fans.
Cleaning, towels, linen and maid services are included in the cost of each villa. Maid service with a full linen change is provided once a week. Pool towels are provided for each guest in addition to the bath and hand towels.
There are two shared pools and a large BBQ area containing both a BBQ spit and traditional baking oven.
Kokkino Chorio is 40 minutes from Chania city and the Retreat Village of Kokkino Chorio is 5 minutes drive away while Plaka and Almyrida villages are a further 5 minutes drive each.
The apartments are mostly arranged over two floors with a lovely spiral staircase connecting the floors, and are decorated with colorful prints on the wall, wicker furniture, pretty soft furnishings and lovely pieces of traditional Cretan pottery are scattered artfully about and with air-conditioning, the interiors are light and airy.
A beautifully rocky sea side covered in sea shells, gifts of the sea, it can be said that they have fallen in love with the rocks and have became one with them.
The following is a description of the excursion we did to the beach of Marmara which is located at the end of the Aradena Gorge south of Crete. It includes a car trip from Chania to Sfakia, from there a small boat trip to Loutro, and from there a small hiking tour along the E4 hiking trail to Marmara. And of course the same route back. This excursion fits nicely for a one day trip from Chania. For the hiking you need plenty of water! You can see an image gallery of the trip with descriptions at http://www.crete-photos.gr/thumbnails.php?album=91The first boat from Sfakia to Loutro leaves at 10:30am. To arrive in time for this boat, we started at about 8:30am from Chania by car. Arriving in Sfakia, we managed to find easily a parking place at the port. We probably wouldn't have been so lucky if we went in July or August, as there would have been a lot more people due to the tourism high season.
The boat trip is being served by ANENDYK company (www.anendyk.gr). The same company serves also the rest of the routes of this region (Sfakia to Paleochora and Gavdos, Sfakia to Loutro and Agia Roumeli, Paleochora to Sougia and Agia Roumeli). The ticket to Loutro costs 3,50 Euro one way. We bought the return ticket at the same time, and thus the ticket for both ways was reduced to 5,50 Euros. The tickets are sold in a small kiosk just before the pier.
The ferry we took was the Daskalogiannis. Beside transferring people, the ferry does also take cars. But I'm asking myself for what reason one would take a car on this trip. Loutro and Agia Roumeli don't have roads to get there, and why would someone take the ferry to get for example to Sougia if he could easily go there by car??
The ferry does also have a closed deck, but most of the people gathered on the upper deck where there are covered benches. So there is some sunlight protection. The duration of the trip to Loutro is very small. The whole procedure took less than 30 minutes . On the trip you can see the beach “Glyka Nera” (Sweet Waters) just after Sfakia. You can get there also by car and a walk of about 15 minutes.
After getting out of the ferry in Loutro, it is not clear where the E4 trail is located. The seaside of Loutro is full of shops and cafes. We asked and we pointed to some stairs between to buildings. After a short while, we did indeed get to the trail. We saw the markings which are along the trail on stones or special signs (at least these marking should be along the whole part of the trail, but more on this later).
At the beginning of the trail the way is pretty steep and uphill. But we were rewarded with a beautiful view over Loutro. After a short while the path becomes more smooth. Reaching over Loutro, there is a castle from the Othoman Period. At this point there are the last trees that can provide shade. The rest of the route has little trees, so it doesn't suit for stops.
Continuing on the path to Marmara, we found 2 small bays. The first one is called Phoenix, and the second Lykos. In each of those bays, there is a small tavern. But we didn't stop at any of them, so I don't have any opinion on the food or service they provide.
At the second bay (Lycos) we were faced to our first (and only) problem: we could not find the markings of the E4 trail in order to continue! We were either blind or the markings just don't exist! We lost about 1 hour trying out the various routes with no luck. To our luck, someone else passing through showed us the correct path. We had to go down to the bay, through the buildings, and continue along the shore. At the end of the shore, there are some rocks which we had to climb up. This was the most difficult part of the walk. After climbing up those rocks, we found again the e$ trail 
markings.
If we don't take into account the time we lost trying to find the E4 trail at the Lycos bay, the whole hiking trip took us between 45minutes to 1 hour to get from Loutro to Marmara. Marmara is a relative small bay, and unfortunately (or fortunately... it depends on the viewpoint) there were a lot of other people. At least there was no music or other destructing events. There were a lot of small private boats with which people are getting there from Sfakia or Loutro. Behind the bay, the exit of the Aradena Gorge is visible. On top of a rock, there is a small tavern with relative cheap and good food. It's a carefully built building that doesn't destroy the image of the bay. There are also some rooms for rent, but with no electricity! We also learnt that the tavern is operated by the same person who operates the Chrysostomos restaurant in Chania. He closes for the summer period in Chania and opens in Marmara
The water is very clear and relatively cold. This is to be expected for the southern beaches of Crete. Inside the water, and very few meters east of the beach, there are 3-4 caves that can be reached easily by swimming. The second cave is very impressive as it is connected through the water with the third. So you swim into the second cave, and get out through the third cave!
For the return trip, there are 2 possible choices: you can leave early and get to Loutro by foot from the same E4 trail, or you can take the taxi boat which leaves at about 17:30 and get to Loutro. The taxi boat costs about 4 Euros. We split and some of us took the hiking way back to Loutro and the others went with the taxi boat. The last boat from Loutro back to Chania leaves Loutro at 18:15.
You could also continue after Loutro by foot the E4 trail and reach Sfakia, so you wouldn't be restricted to be in time for the last ferry from Loutro. This would be another 2 hours of hiking.
As we lost quite some time when we got lost at the Lycos bay, we didn't really enjoy the beach at Marmara. There was not enough time as we also wanted to eat at the tavern. But if you follow the instructions I gave and don't get lost at Lycos, you will have one more our to enjoy the beach!
At the way back to Loutro, there was someone playing music at the tavern at Lycos, and there were some people drinking tsikoudia. Unfortunately we had no time to stay as we would have lost the ferry from Loutro.
The boat from Loutro to Sfakia had a lot more people than before, as there were all these tourists getting back from Agia Roumeli after wandering through the Samaria Gorge.
At the way back from Sfakia to Chania, we did stop at the Askifou village (you have to go into the village and not go around it). At the small square of the village we took a seat at the kafeneio located up the road and ordered some Sfakianes Pites (pies with cheese and honey) which were excellent! Of course we also tried their tsikoudia!
