Chania; Wednesday, 29 July, 2020

In the original plan for the day I was supposed to be booked on jeep tour up into the White Mountains, but unfortunately the tour company had been in contact the previous day to let me know that there weren’t enough people booked on the tour for it to run, so it had been cancelled. Instead I decided to head to the south of the island, but as there was only one round trip by bus each day, and that didn’t leave until after 12 it meant I was able to have a nice lie in and a slow start to the morning.

I made it over to the bus station with about 30 minutes to spare before my departure and managed to walk straight up to the ticket office and get my ticket. About 5 minutes later a massive crowd descended on the bus station and the queue became enormous. By pure luck I found a seat right next to what turned out to be our bus south to Palaiochora, so when boarding was getting ready to start I was able to tack onto the back of the small group of elderly Cretan women who barged their way past the queuing tourists to bag themselves the best seats on the bus.

The journey up and over the White Mountains is spectacular. It’s less than 60Km from Chania to Palaiochora in a straight line, but due to the mountains the bus takes nearly 2 hours to complete the stunning journey. There was just over four hours between arrival and departure time, which turned out to be about the right amount of time to look around the town. Palaiochora occupies a small peninsular of land so it has beaches on both sides of town – a stony beach that looks east along the south coast and a larger sandy beach that looks to the west.

I had a wander around the centre of town, taking in both the east and west sides of the town, before stopping off at a beachfront restaurant for a late lunch.

After lunch I went for a longer walk, this time up around the headland at the end of peninsular, from where there are great views over the sandy beach and up into the rear of the small castle that sits on the highest point above the town.

That was my next stop, which turned out to be a longer walk than I expected as I had to walk the whole way round the back of the peninsular and then half way back into the centre of town before a little roadway lead back in the opposite direction up the onto the promontory that the castle is positioned on, which in 33C heat was a bit excessive.

I eventually made it up to the castle and I wasn’t disappointed by the views from up there. From the tower you can see both beaches and the full stretch of this part of the coast, as well as the town and the stunning scene of the mountains shooting straight up from behind the town forming a wall of rock.

I spent quite a bit of time looking round the castle, before finding the set of steps that lead quickly back down into the centre of town. I rewarded my earlier effort by stopping off at an ice-cream shop and having an absolutely heavenly rose flavoured ice cream, which restored my energy levels.

I had about 45 minutes before the bus was due to depart, so I headed over towards the bus station and the nearby stony beach and found a small seafront bar to have a quick drink in before heading back to the bus station and taking the bus back up through the mountains and over to Chania.

I only wanted a very light meal, as I was still pretty full from the very generous lunch I’d had in Palaiochora, so I once again headed to one of the tavernas in the old town and had a quick dinner there before heading to bed.