Day Eight -- Chania and Driving in Crete

Our car rental company said they had to deliver our car to us at 9 a.m. so we dragged our tired bones out of bed and headed downstairs to meet Yiannis from Anna's Cars. We have a little, red, gutless Toyota Argo. We ate a good breakfast in the hotel and headed for the city of Chania. It is on the north side of the eastern region of Crete. This is a big island, which we didn't fully appreciate until we started heading for Chania. There is one road to Chania from Heraklion.  It is filled with tourists in rental cars and semis. In Greece, drivers ride on the shoulder so that faster cars can pass them without entering the other lane. It is a scary process at first but Matt had learned this process after driving to Olympia, Delphi and Meteora.  Many of the rental car drivers on this one road to Chania had no idea why people were driving on the shoulder. It made for a long, frustrating drive. Luckily, the views were lovely.

 

We arrived in Chania close to noon and found timed parking. We stopped first for some bougatsa, a flaky cheese-filled pastry sprinkled with sugar, in a restaurant that serves only this one dish. It was good.

 

Then we strolled down the little streets of Chania.

 

We stopped for lunch at a restaurant recommended by our guidebook. Matt chose his fresh fish to be fried and I chose a Cretan salad, which turned out to be a Greek salad with small, dried olives. 

 

The food was good but what we have learned is that you should never be in a hurry when you sit down at a restaurant in Greece. The process is slow, the dishes are large and if you want the check you have to wask for it....and be prepared to wait and wait for it. When they clear the dishes from your table, if you haven't cleaned your plate you have to go through the kind of conversation I had with my grandmother multiple times. "Was there a problem? Did you not like our food?" I dread this encounter. The servings are large here and we have tried to share dishes but it is hard to judge it correctly. Often, after you have asked for the check the server brings you a free dessert and a couple of shots of raki. Don't ever sit down to eat in Greece if you are in a hurry. While Matt waited for the check, left to walk down the street to see the Church of Agio Nikolaos, which the Ottomans made into a mosque and the Greek Orthodox made back into a church.

 

Then we headed down to the harbor. That is when we discovered what a charming city Chania is. We walked the medieval harbor wall....

 

marveled that there was still snow on the mountains...

 

wondered at the drying octopus...

 

and took so many photos.

 

By then we knew we had to get back to our car or risk a parking ticket. GPS on my phone has been invaluable as we try to navigate narrow little streets lacking signage. We got to our car with four minutes to spare and started the several hour trek home past lovely views. When we got back we decided we should explore the harbor here near our hotel.

 

We walked down towards the medieval fortress.

 

Matt got tickets for us to go inside and explore. I liked the pit filled with cannonballs.

 

But mostly I liked walking the ramparts.

 

We got back to our hotel in time to make it to our reservation at Herbs' Garden, the outdoor restaurant on the rooftop of our hotel. 

 

We dined well as we looked over our harbor. We got to telling stories about Bryan's keen sense of humor and I laughed until my stomach hurt.  We got there at 8 p.m. and didn't get back to our room until after 10:30 p.m.  Have I mentioned that dining is a slow process in Greece?