Help MN holiday fairies! Where in Crete?

[AndIFeedEmGunpowder]

Thought I had booked a brilliant hotel for our holiday in July. Well, I haven't. At the moment looks like we will be staying at Chania airport. DH is not convinced.

Can anyone recommend a nice hotel/apartment? Even a village? We'd love to be able to walk to a taverna or two so we can drink and a sandy beach would be fab as we have a toddler.

Thank you, thank you [raises glass of retsina]

Ooh thank you for the tips Nutella!

Oh blimey - was posting on app before and for some reason lots of posts weren't there and just discovered this parallel universe conversation about Sougia! How funny Nutella that we were talking about the same place too!

We were pleasantly surprised with the supermarkets in Sougia, eg were able to buy nappies etc so don't worry if you don't have everything you need when you arrive. Defo take cash tho!

And I will apologise in advance for blatantly irrelevant photo, but here's DD in Crete with the totally crazy Greek granny who adopted her. At one point we wondered if we would be able to wrestle DD back off her (note also the awesomely useful needle and thread she has on her pinny)

Have a wonderful time out there - I'm sure you'll love it

ps - Granny put her teeth in specially for the photo - she normally keeps them in her shopping bag

Plakias. Southern coast right in centre. We drove to chania for a day trip and I remember it being an easy drive-mainly main roads.

Plakias has a gorgeous beach, a few tavernas. It was wonderful. Plus boat rides to a nearby beach (cant remember name) with a river mouth. A walk/pedal boat up the river to a waterfall. Truely amazing. I want to go back. (Warning-do not walk to said beach as the track is down side of cliff. I nearly died. Twice).

at Granny's teeth in the shopping bag! Eagles your DD is gorgeous, what a marvellous photo. I am v excited about Sougia.

Party I am very clumsy so there would be no hope for me! I will look at Plakias.

Granny gave DP a massive bottle of homemade raki when she realised he was rather partial to it - he got into awful trouble at check-in as we were flying Ryanair and it took us well over our weight limit!

Can only think of one solution to that Eagles

Actually Ryanair with Raki hangover probably v bad idea.

You won't escape the World Cup, op! All the bars will show it I remember watching some football thing or the other with DH in the beach bars there, great atmosphere.

Parallel universe indeed, eagles! But my crappy app doesn't show any photos?! Boo.

Oh, good point about the shops. We did seem to buy a huge selection of wine, cheese and olives (the only things we really looked for at the time!) impressed thy stock nappies too.

Op, look forward to hearing an update as we are planning to go back when DS is a toddler. We only travelled there when we were young and careless!

Galazio Kima (think it's just called GK hotel now) in Kalyves is very nice but pricier than other places mentioned here.

DH will be THRILLED they are showing the world cup. He has got one of those sticker books and it is all quite serious in the Gunpowder household. He did actually suggest we went to South America for the summer... Took me a while to realise his true motives! Whenever England get knocked out I reckon he will switch to supporting Greece,

I don't mind World Cup as long as I can have little cheese pies and Greek salad instead of egg, chips and beans.

Notnow I will look at your place too, thank you!

Sounds like my DH, too!

Thank you all for recommending such gorgeous places. I want to stay in all of them.

I think we are going to try and do a swish week at notnow's GK place, and a thrifty week in Sougia. Will report back!

I'm reading this with envy as we have just returned from a fabulous week in Crete. We pushed the boat out and stayed here.

Have a great holiday.

It looks lovely Bunbaker

Hope you have a lovely trip gunpowder - great idea to split between two sites with different budgets!

If anyone likes the laid-back vibe of Sougia, I can also heartily recommend Cirali in Turkey, which I am sure is Sougia's spiritual twin! Take a cheap flight to Antalya (Thomson and Thomas Cook always do last-minute cheapies there) and then it's an hour or two along the coast. Cirali has a beautiful long sweeping beach, with lots of independent hotels and guest houses along its length. Prices are pretty cheap (quite a bit cheaper than Greece) and there's plenty to do (lots of yoga classes, ancient ruins, plus hiking along the waymarked Lycean Way, which runs all along the coast). We've visited at the beginning and end of the season on separate occasions and found it lovely and quiet (and in the autumn the sea is amazingly warm!)

can you tell I want to be a travel agent when I grow up?

Looks gorgeous Bunbaker. Ohhhhh I want to go everywhere!

Thank you Eagles. Cirali sounds fabulous too! Maybe next year.

Great tip, Eagles!