CRETE PHOTO DIARY, PART ONE

Okay so, a handful of days ago, my family and I started talking about how we wanted to go abroad for a week or so, perhaps the Amalfi Coast or Rome. I kind of just shrugged this off, because I’d literally spent my Summer trudging around London and Watford. My dad was like “nah I’m good thanks,” so BAM, two days later I was on an aeroplane to Malia, Crete, party central. With my mum. And it was awesome.

As some of you may know, I have a problem with taking photos. I can go out for the day and take hundreds of photos of a cigarette balancing on a tree, or a baby on some swings. So, naturally, I probably took over 2,000 photos in total whilst on my stay in Greece (keep in mind that we were literally only there for a week). I will split up my trip to Greece into two parts, but that still leaves a lot of photos. Bear with.

So my first day in Crete was spent travelling and running over people’s feet with my suitcase, so I think we’ll just skip that part out and move on. The second day, however, started by me awaking from a four-hour slumber and wondering where the heck I was. Then, the minute I heard the incessant chirping of the crickets and breathed in the air that was so humid that it was almost an effort to respire, I was like “oh right, I’m in Malia”. 

I spent the morning trying to impress the hotel staff with my Greek (to which they laughed and said I have a “long way to go”, the cheek), and then we took off to the classic Strip of Malia, where all the partygoers go to, well, party. If I’m being honest, it was kind of sad that this cute little Greek town has been turned into a place where people go to just get drunk and do The Thing. It was all ‘foam parties’ and ‘booze cruises’ – where is the authentic Greek culture? Where is the rich history behind this? Why are the locals being sent away to the “olde town” whilst skinny white boys carrying six packs vomit up tequila onto their land?

Malia beach, by the way, would be beautiful if it weren’t for the severe congestion full of tourists burning their pale flesh. So, we stopped there for a bit, cramming to get a view of the ocean, before heading back to our hotel Maria Rousse. There, after taking advantage of their awesome pool and overindulging on ice-cream, our rep (Calvin? Kevin?) told us about the “classic” drinking forfeits that they have over here, where they pour beer down your throat (Suffragette, anyone?). Naturally, I first thought he said spit instead of beer, and that led to a very awkward conversation. 

I asked one of the hotel staff what his name was, and you know when you ask someone something and they reply and you don’t understand so you ask again, just to repeat this vicious cycle? Well, as not to embarrass myself further, I then proceeded to nod. To this day, I’m sure his name is the Spanish verb for ‘we live’. 

The Olde Town was definitely my favourite place in the whole of Malia. You get to see all the locals in their little communities and big families, with the children playing football in the street and the elderly nodding off on chairs outside their houses (this is actually a really common thing). These houses, by the way, were all rustic and messy and absolutely stunning, and just how I expected authentic Greek houses to look like. 

We ate at a place called Kaleman for dinner the first/ second night, which served pretty awesome food. The only problem was the rogue bug that landed slap-bang in the middle of my food – apparently I screamed and a bunch of people jumped from surprise, but eh, let’s not get caught up in the small details.

The third day was spent walking so much that I’m surprised my kneecaps didn’t spontaneously combust from all the friction. We walked down this massive stretch of dust road, which was filled with rusty, quaint buildings – classic Greek buildings that people actually live in (funnily enough). They just seemed so unnaturally stunning that I assumed they were a bunch of antique holiday homes.

I don’t know about you guys, but I have never been to an all-marble cemetery. But, that’s exactly what we passed as we continued our walk down this long, deserted road. The coffins were out in the open, and were all made of this gleaming white marble. The tombs were larger than I would have imagined, and a small white chapel shadowed over the land at the back. 

We went down to Malia Port, which is insanely overrated. All there was was a couple of rusty boats and two local children staring at me as I tried to take semi-decent photos of the nothingness surrounding us. Don’t get me wrong, it was a cute place to stop at, but  I wouldn’t walk a mile just to see it. If you walked down a little bit though, you would get to the beach. Pale sand, choppy turquoise waves.. it was magnifique. And, at the edge of the water was a small white lone chair. I don’t know why, but the simplicity of an abandoned chair overlooking the waves was really beautiful. 

We continued our trek, leading us to a small resort called Cretan Malia Park. As nice as it was, I don’t understand why someone would pay to go all the way down to Greece, just to stay in a big resort and stay there the whole time. I always thought that the whole reason behind going abroad would be to explore new places, cultures, languages, and the such – not stay by the pool all day – but eh, I could be wrong.

There, we ordered some quick food, and were served by a rather grumpy waiter. Once we finished ordering though, he was like “all inclusive, yeah?” and we said that no, in fact we weren’t. His features then shifted slightly, and so did his attitude. From then on, he was a lot more positive, and even put extra ham in my vegetarian sandwich which was thoughtful. 

For dinner that evening, we ate in the roof garden of Stablos and Elizabeth, which gave us a great view of the square below, which all fitted around the church with a clock tower dusted with birds. The food portions were crazily large, as in the starter alone could have fed three people. And my madre and I both ordered two courses each. I kid you not. We were practically bursting at the seams when we left.

I have found that countries with hot climates such as Greece and Turkey tend to have roads filled with people on mopeds – which makes sense, considering how much cooler they will be (both temperate-wise and status-wise). But never before have I seen people riding with literal animals tucked into their armpits, like I did on my third day in Greece. The loud rip of a moped erupted from the road to the side of me, and I looked over to see a man riding, with a small fluffy dog under his arm, fur ruffled by the wind. And what’s more insane is the fact that I saw people both on the phone and smoking, driving at the same time as they held a kid on their lap. I have to admit that they’re very skilled people, but boy is that a weird sight for the eyes.

Day four started with a bang. Or more accurately, the crashing noise of my mother trying to prise open the balcony door. 

By the way, there’s this one little patisserie in Malia which sells the best ice-cream I’ve ever seen. I don’t know what it’s called in English, but the title printed above the door looked something like Syovpo’s. I ate an insane amount of ice-cream (oh hey there, Crohn’s Disease) from that shop, with the only problem being that the owner had a tendency to close up the part of the shop that sold ice-cream at super random times of the day, and for no apparent reason. 

Anyway, the forth day was pretty laid-back, as we just walked around and tested out food. We ate dinner at Toto Lotto, which consisted of pretty food in very pretty surroundings. The tables were awesome, with slabs of glass covering a whole collection of postcards from various places and events – but the dead pufferfish that stared right into your soul was a definite downer.

I spent the rest of the day out in the warm weather, writing. According to my notes from that day, I basically just thought about my Greek expectations. To summarise, I imagined crumbling white handmade buildings (thank Mamma Mia for that one, kids) with locals riding up steep paths on donkeys. For some reason, the fact that we were going to Malia, a part of Greece famous for partying, didn’t completely register with me, hence my surprise at all the gigantic commercialised partygoer things.