Moving on from Irakleon ...

Thursday, May 06, 2010

Greetings from Sitia!

Thankfully the hotel’s wi-fi connection was fixed so that we can now log in from our room! Yea! We’ve often been the first in the morning to arrive at an airport, waking up numerous airport check-in and security folks…but this is the first time we’ve been the first visitors of the season! Wow! But - to start from this morning.

We got up around 7:30 a.m. and started to reassemble everything back into our suitcases, then down to our final breakfast at our wonderful Lato Boutique Hotel! We’ll miss it, that’s for sure! Headed out of Iraklion, and again, realized what a big city it really is! We feel very fortunate to have found our hotel – in a perfect location for those tourist sites and areas, as well as beautiful view and great food and wine!

Drove east along the coast past some lovely hill-top villages. Once we passed Agios Nikolaos the traffic dropped to almost nothing as we headed to Sitia. Arrived at the hotel just a bit after noon, to find the staff busy getting things ready – and I mean things like waste paper baskets, tables and chairs by the pool, etc. Sitia Bay Hotel is a lovely family-owned, 4-storey hotel on the street next to the sea. The basement level is taken up with public rooms, a stunning pool and Jacuzzi and common area. Stories 2 and 3 are the rooms. Story 4 is the rooftop (apparently a very popular thing to have) – with sun beds, tables and chairs, and a beautiful view over the beach and town. Our room includes a small kitchen, which would be nice if we’d planned on doing any cooking … but for once, we haven’t! There is also a nice balcony with comfortable chairs – and Robert’s favorite feature?? Screens on all the windows and sliding doors! They’re GREAT as R did have a bit of mosquito problem at the Lato Boutique. He did think about running the water in the kitchen sink and bathroom – and boy, was that a good idea! As this place has been closed since last October (wonder what the family does in the winter?) the water definitely had been in the pipes for a while!

We unpacked and headed by car into town. It wasn’t far, but we were unable to find free parking in the big public lot. However, there were lots of pay spaces on the street, so we took one of those. R discovered that you can buy for 1 Euro a parking card that is good for an hour or so. What you do with the card is punch out the month, day, and time that you parked – and leave it on the dashboard! I was so tickled with it that we’ve photographed it and I’m planning on taking it home! Walked along the waterfront looking for a place for lunch. Found a beach-side place set up. Ordered an eggplant salad plus a Sitia-area cheese pie to split. Wow! First off, the eggplant was cut in half and the insides mixed with onion, tomato and feta cheese – it was AMAZING! The cheese pie looked like a quesadilla – very, very thin pie crust for top and bottom with a thin layer of Greek cheese in the center, served hot. It was also terrific. We are so much enjoying our Cretan lunches; very flavorful food!

After lunch, we walked along the sea front … only to look up and voila! There was our hotel! Why ever did we drive??? Found some sunscreen that I’m hoping I’m not allergic to, and then picked up the car and headed to the Sitia Archeological Museum. Very nice collection of local artifacts, and some good maps of where things had been unearthed. From there we headed to the closest site, Petras….which…guess what? Closed! (Again, not sure if it’s because it’s late in the afternoon, and most sites close by 3 p.m. or if there are other problems…oh well!) Back to the hotel for a rest, and now are getting ready to go to dinner. To be honest, I am so incredibly impressed with the food here on Crete. It is nothing short of amazing – and we still have more than a week to go!!

More later!
m

We’re back from dinner! Walked down the beach to a restaurant recommended by the hotel…The following is the name and address: Παραδοσίαχή Ταβέρνα at Καραυνλή 36 – just in case you ever find yourself in Sitia and want a good place to eat -- and you may not believe it, but I found it! Also note: There are no street numbers on any of the buildings, which does make the search even more difficult…I had to find it in Greek…
Good meal all around, but no photographs; sorry! I had aubergine salad (baba ghanoush, basically) followed by a grilled chicken skewer that came with both rice and French fries and was delicious. R had a very fresh fish (believed to be red bream) – had just swum into the restaurant a half hour previously apparently – and two of them appeared on his plate – all of them…these were served with French fries and rice salad. We didn’t need any dessert, but the restaurant gave us one anyway, and it was delicious! Basically it was two slices of a very thick chocolate and vanilla cake, with small stacks of whipped cream and then chocolate sauce dribbled over everything….YUM!
Wandered back to the hotel after that and off to bed soon!
Much love,
m
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