Lake Kournas and Georgioupoli

Lake Kournas

Today's entertainment was a walk in two parts: a nature walk by Lake Kournas, Crete's only freshwater lake and a visit to the seaside at Georgioupoli. The Sunflower walk guide for Western Crete showed a path reaching the lake via a gorge and continuing along its far side, and we hoped to explore the gorge and perhaps even walk all around the lake. We noted that it had been published 15 or so years ago, so we were not completely confident.

We were dropped off by the second entry to the lake and were a little put off by the number of tavernas located in the immediate area - not mentioned in the walk book. We set off with the idea of walking anti-clockwise round the lake and quickly encountered a fine goose cruising along by the edge of the lake, which I have now identified as a Swan Goose.

Just a little further on, I saw this delightfully elegant wader, with long orange legs held out behind when in flight: a Black-winged Stilt.

We turned the corner of the lake successfully, crossed a bridge over a small outflow and followed a marked path beside a field, through a gate which led down towards the water again, but here the shrubbery was impenetrable. After a heroic struggle we decided to admit defeat and retraced our steps. On the way back, I looked down into the outflow and was delighted to spot a terrapin. The hazy orange shapes in the water are fish.

We returned to out start point and headed along a track in the opposite direction to see if we could find the promised gorge this way. 

This track proved to offer a veritable wonderland of butterflies. One of the other members of our party saw a previously unknown (to either of us) black and white butterfly yesterday and I was thrilled to see the same species myself ....

... but what was it? A little later I saw a similar, but more highly coloured, butterfly.

This one I was confident in identifying as an Eastern Festoon. Only later did I discover that other one was the endemic Cretan Festoon. How wonderful!

We took a track uphill from one end of the lake, hoping it would lead to the gorge,  but eventually it reached a dead end - a typically ramshackle building. We were forced to concede that the round-the-lake walk was not going to happen and retraced our steps

On the return leg we saw a Cleopatra as well - like a brighter Brimstone, with orange patches on the upper forewings. And then we were treated to the sight of a Swallowtail feeding in a very concentrated way, seemingly oblivious ti our presence, from the clover-like flowers of a food plant. The delicate colours of its underwings were beautifully displayed.

This brought us back to our starting point. We had originally planned to walk the 5km from the lake into the coastal village of Georgioupoli, but it was by now quite hot and a walk along a road did not appeal very much, so we cheated and took a cab. After lunch we began our exploration.

Georgioupoli is mostly famous for the small chapel built on a stone causeway reaching out into the sea. It is a wonderful sight.

Walking back from the chapel towards the small harbour there and lovely views inland towards the White Mountains, still with a bit of snow on their peaks.

We decided we would now walk for half an hour along the beach and see how far we got. It was very instructive just how difficult it was to estimate distances: one of us somewhat underestimated and teh other massively overestimated how far we might get.

It was, as ever, delightful walking along at the water's edge in a pleasant breeze on a warm day.

Conditions: hot, under clear skies.

Distance: probably about three miles at the lake and 2.5 along the beach and back.

Rating: four and a half stars. One the very best butterfly walks of all time.

Gouvernetou Monastery to Stavros

 View from the top of the path

We were dropped off at Moni Gouvernetou, about 300m above sea level, with the mission of walking 8 km via two gorges back to our apartment in Stavros. We walked through the monastery's grounds and looked in to see the small monastery church. Photography is forbidden, so I have no photo to show. It was noticeable that the facade was more heavily decorated near the base than around the top of the columns.

You go through a gate and begin the descent to the gorge on a well made path with the appearance of crazy paving. Quite soon you reach the little bear cave with some ruined buildings outside. Inside the cave chapel there is a giant stalagmite vaguely in the shape of a bear.

The path continues downhill with an increasing number of switchbacks. Lovely views open up to the sea where the gorge ends.

To left, caves and a sort of stone cell can be seen on the left hand side of the gorge. We later came to understand that these housed hermit monks.
 

 Eventually you can see the bridge which crosses the bottom of the gorge. This is the site of the Katholikou Monastery, said to be the oldest on Crete,which was founded by St John the hermit in the 11th century.

The buildings of the ruined monastery are exquisite and the tranquility of the site makes it easy to see why it was chosen.

They are still clearly used at least sometimes and we read that the monks from Gouvernetou and local people make an annual pilgrimage down there, which perhaps explains the excellence of the path. It seems that it was constantly raided by African corsairs and that this led to its abandonment.

We descended a steep slippery path from the bridge and entered the gorge to begin the long slow climb.

The signature plant was the maroon Mediterranean Alum.

Gradually the gorge widened and we could up the slope to the sky.

As the gorge widened we emerge into a high sort of plateau ringed with mountains. As we climbed the opposite side, there were good views back over the path we had taken with sea beyond.

Below us now was a large depression and looking due west, we saw what appeared to be the pass through to Stavros.

It turned out that the route was a bit more complicated, involving another shorter gorge. Eventually we emerged at the base of the mountains and strolled downhill past innumerable beehives back to the apartment.

But before we left the last gorge, just as Ange said "we haven't seen many butterflies today" up popped this wonderful Scarce Swallowtail.

Conditions: cloudy, but quite bright and warm.

Distance: 5 miles.

Rating: four stars.

Chania

The harbour mouth

Today we are visiting the Venetian port city of Chania. It is described as one of the oldest continuously occupied cities in the world. Although written with a Ch in English (and Chi in Greek), it is pronounced Hania.

We took the bus from Stavros and got off by the Market building, which dates from 1913.  Nearby was a lone minaret, one of the vestiges of the Turkish period of occupation.

 The market is cross shaped, quite spacious and airy.

From here we walked through some shopping streets to reach the cathedral. It dates only from 1868 and has a pleasant square in front of it.

A little further on we reached the Schiavo Bastion.  It appears quite squat, but we climbed to the top and were delighted and surprised by the flower meadow which covered its roof and by the view over the city's rooftops.

We even saw a Swallowtail.  It was a bit battered and perhaps on its last legs, but still the first we have seen. It seemed darker than the one I saw in Italy two years ago.

Now we went round the back of the Tower to follow the course of the old Venetian walls towards the sea.

When you reach the sea you have to turn right, passing another flower meadow on a patch of waste land, the Byzantine museum in a small Ventian chapel and the Firka, the main Venetian barracks. You turn the corner to be confronted by the narrow harbour mouth, with the famous Venetian lighthouse on the opposite side. With careful placement, the Stavros mountains can be lined up behind it.

We walked around the harbour, noticing the Mosque of the Janissaries on the other side. Built in 1645, just after the Turks displaced the Venetians, it is the oldest Turkish building on Crete.

After lunch in one of the innumerable harbour-side restaurants, we continued round the harbour passing the Venetian Great Arsenal and the Neoria, former naval yards, started in 1461.

We carried on along the narrow causeway that leads to the lighthouse, passing the St Nicholas church on the way (photographed from the harbour side) ....

... and then enjoying the majestic sweep of the harbour wall. Its construction started in 1320.

The lighthouse terrace was luckily open for a few minutes to allow access for a film crew and views across the harbour. The clouds had lifted a little and the White Mountains were now visible in the background.

We retraced our steps to enter the narrow streets of the old town just near the mosque and later meet up with others of our party for an open air dinner in a restaurant beneath the city walls. 

Conditions: hot and sunny.

Distance:  about four miles from start to finish.

Rating: four and half stars. A beautiful city, especially around the harbour.

Stavros

Taverna Thanasis: our destination

We are in Crete for a Wildflower holiday.  However yesterday's first field trip was extremely gruelling and so we decided to opt out of today's one in order to explore our immediate surroundings - we are staying in an apartment on the edge of the village of Stavros on the coast of the Akrotiri Peninsula.

We turned right out of the site and followed a winding road down to the beautiful almost circular bay at the east end of the main bay. This was our initial view.

From the other side, the circular nature was a bit clearer.

The film Zorba the Greek was famously filmed here and, inevitably, Zorba's Taverna is close at hand.

There are two former windmills - we had noticed that it is very windy - and one of these, although lacking its sails, has been attractively restored.

The other one has been clad in stone and had some sort of battlemented construction built on to it. It looks ridiculous.

We turned inland in search of the taverna at far end of the main beach where we had eaten the previous night and walked along the streets a bit. Some houses are smart, but others are ramshackle. Eventually we spotted a way onto the beach. There were some trees at the back of the beach and the overall effect was quite Caribbean.

We walked along the soft sandy beach, noticing the large amount of rock at the waterline. One of these rocks had the imprint of sea creatures. We couldn't say if they were alive or dead.

Plants had colonised the end of the beach, creating something like the sort of flower meadow we had expected to see on our wild flower holiday (instead it seems to be focused on a search for rare orchids - not really our thing).

The splendid red flower is Red Hottentot Fig - apparently an alien invader.

We crossed some rocks to reach the taverna where we had an excellent lunch and enjoyed fantastic views of the bay with the mountains beyond.

Conditions: clear sky, reasonably warm, about 18 degrees. Quite windy, so the sea was quite rough.

Distance: 3.5 miles

Rating: four stars


Sightings

We saw quite a lot of this pretty flower: Sea Rocket.

And I was pleased to begin to see some butterflies - yesterday was too dull. I got a nice shot of this Common Blue.