Hiking the Samaria Gorge

Mom wanted to do something different. Not shopping, not museums, not wandering around cities and ruins.

So, why not hiking?!?!?!Located about 3 hours from Chania (there's a direct bus, easy to get to!), the Samaria Gorge offers an excellent hiking course. Excellent because it's 95% DOWNHILL or flat! And there are quite a few rest stops with nice toilets in between. It doesn't get any better than this : )
The hike took us about 6 hours. The scenery itself is pretty, but nothing spectacular. The first part (downhill) through the woods could be anywhere in Oregon. The latter part (flat) along the gorge could be any narrow gorge. I think it would've been better if there was a lot more flowing water. But then again, I guess if the water was flowing, we wouldn't be able to walk in the gorge.The only problem was the lack of shade...it was so hot and sunny out there, I think I turned another shade darker by the end of the day. The overpriced diet coke at the finish line hit the right spot!

Anyways, the hiking course is primarily a one-way route.
(I didn't run into any during my hike, but I'm sure that there are some crazy people out there who'd want to go the opposite direction and climb uphill)
Meaning that you don't end where you began. The end to this route was a tiny tiny town, with one of the most remote, peaceful, and beautiful beaches I've ever seen. The turquoise water was absolutely clear, so many fishes!!! I'm not a beach person, but I seriously thought that I'd like to come back here with a swimsuit someday.However, being in the middle of nowhere, the place is accessible only by boat. And they only have one boat a day back to another town with bus connections to Chania. That meant we had to wait 5 hours. Which we didn't really feel like doing; we were a bit tired.
Thinking we had no other option though, we grabbed some lunch at a beach side shack. Disgusting cheeseburger. Yuck.
To kill time while waiting, I took out my guide book and noticed that there may be a boat to a separate town with bus connections to Heraklion. We needed to return there tonight anyways, for our flight out tomorrow. I ran back to the boat ticket office and inquired about it...and there was indeed a boat leaving in 30 minutes. Perfect!!! I love it when guide books turn out useful : )

It took us the boat ride (45 minutes) and 2 buses (one of them with a chain smoking driver), but we finally made it back to Heraklion before midnight.
EXHAUSTING day...