Chania

Chania

Chania is located on the westernmost side of Crete. This is where the most popular beach villages are found.

Chania is located on the westernmost side of Crete.This is where the most popular beach villages are found. The most impressive beaches are Balos, Elafonissi and Falassarna, while there are innumerable other amazing beaches around the coastline, from organized resorts to secluded coves. Chania keeps evident its traditional architecture. A walk in the Old Town with the intense Venetian and Turkish architecture is a walk back in time also, the Venetian port of Chania Town is the most characteristic spot of western Crete.Explore the Medieval Castles you will find on your way, trek the many paths along with forests and gorges, visit the small local museums that depict the history and even try a chat with the locals at the traditional restaurants. Visitors can also make day excursions to other regions of Crete, including Rethymnon and Heraklion.

Just imagine a modern city that has sprung up around a medieval fortress with giant walls and even a moat, and within these walls are the buildings and ruins of the people who have settled here over the ages from the Minoans to the Byzantines, Venetians, Turks and the current inhabitants, a mixture of Greeks, Albanians and other nationalities. Most of the major buildings came courtesy of the Venetians who bought the island of Crete after the fall of Constantinople and preceded to fortify Chania which they controlled until 1645 when it fell to the Ottoman Turks. The center of the town was Kasteli which in those days meant it was the most heavily fortified, being the acropolis (upper village). It is also where the remains of the Minoans were uncovered. The massive wall surrounding Kasteli had four gates, two of which were destroyed by German bombing during the Second World War, the other two which are still intact. As the city spread out from Kasteli a new outer wall was built in 1538 and the inner wall and towers were turned into houses. If you walk up Kanevaro street from Venizelos Square you can see remnants of this older wall.

The easiest way to get your bearings is by going to the port. Many of the hotels are in the new town just across from the central market on Hatzimichali Gianhari and if you are staying outside of Chania and are coming to the city by car and bus chances are this is where you are going to end up. If you walk two blocks west from the City Market you will turn right on Halidon Street which will take you past the Pelekanaki Bookshop, the Archaeological Museum, the Cathedral of the Trimartyei, past lots of interesting shops and right to Venizelos Square with its fountain surrounded by cafes including a Starbucks. You are at the entrance to the main harbor. For those who have been to a lot of Greek islands just imagine Old Chania as a cross between Mykonos and Hydra without the whitewash and with a lot more interesting places to shop and eat and drink.

If you are standing in the square facing the sea the area to your left (west) is called Evraiki, which was the Jewish Quarter and features the Etz Hayyim Synagogue which was lovingly restored by my high school history teacher, the famous writer, cook and artist Nikos Stavroulakis. As in many places in Greece the Jews of Chania were rounded up by the Nazis to be sent to concentration camps. The Jews of Chania never made it that far. The boat transporting them was mistakenly sunk by the British and they all drowned. If you take a walk down Zabeliou street and turn left on Kondilaki street you will find signs directing you to the Synagogue. If you continue down Zabeliou, you will pass numerous shops, cafes, restaurants, small hotels and the wonderful Tamam, a sort of mezedopoulion-taverna in an old Turkish Hamam (bath house) and one of the best places we ate in Chania. If you cut down to the waterfront there are the usual fancy looking fish tavernas and tourist shops that you will find on the high-priced realestate of just about any Greek island, most who employ people who stand out front and convince you that their restaurant is the best using a variety of methods to grab your attention.

Going East … from Venizelou square along the harbor road which by the way is closed to automobile traffic you will pass the usual large cafes and tourist restaurants before coming to the Mosque of Kioutsouk Hassan, the oldest Ottoman building in Crete, erected in 1645. Currently it is used as an exhibition hall but it has been a shop, restaurant and a cafe in the course of its history. The back of the mosque has an ugly junta style cement structure that has nothing to do with the original building but was added when it was a cafe or restaurant and may one day be torn down. The area behind the mosque with the tall buildings that overlook the harbor is Kasteli which you can enter by going back to Venizelou Square as I mentioned before. But just to keep it simple we are going to continue along the waterfront and come back later. After the mosque is a series of restaurants, none of which I ate at, though Monastiri has gotten decent reviews in some of the guidebooks, and we almost stopped here but were deterred by the fancy tablecloths and wine glasses. The next few buildings are the hip clubs and bars, the kind of places that are still open when people like me are having breakfast. Across the entrance to the Inner Harbor is the Fortezza, a seasonal club with a free ferry shuttle that crosses the harbor in what was the Bastion of Agios Nicholaos a fortified building where the Venetians and the Turks executed their prisoners. As you continue you will notice that the buildings are larger and more industrial, though most, if not all are restaurants, bars or clubs, and that there are actually fishing boats in the harbor, unlike the outer harbor.

If you walk past the massive Customs House in Katehaki Square (or parking lot) you will come to seven very old, large and interconnected buildings called To Megali Arsenali (Great Arsenals) built by the Venetians which were the shipyards. Originally there were seventeen of these buildings which were built between 1599 and 1607. Now they are used mainly for storage awaiting some higher purpose but of the three at the far end of the harbor one has been turned into the Maritime Museum’s home for the Minoa, a re-constructed Minoan ship. The Minoa which sits impressively within the building was built in 2002 and launched with great ceremony on December 1st 2003. Then on May 29th 2004 they left Crete with a crew of rowers and sailed 210 nautical miles up the coast of the Peloponessos, stopping along the way on the islands of Antikythera and Kythera, the towns of Monemvasia, Kyparissi the islands of Spetsai, Hydra, Poros, the town of Methana, the island of Aegina to Pireaus. The journey took 25 days though only ten days were actually sailing because of bad weather, and returned to the island by ferry. The museum also has historic photos and paintings of Greek warships and fishing boats and two smaller latin sailboats.

From the hole in the wall that used to be the Gate of Sand, Minoos street runs south towards the new city. To the west is a maze of small streets and houses which used to be the red light district of Chania, the largest such area in Crete. In fact it is still the red light district of Chania. If you are nervous about wandering around a neighborhood of brothels then turn right on Drakoloulou Street and that will take you all the way back to Venizelos Square, though it will have changed names to Sifaka and Karaoli-Dimitriou by then. This large neighborhood is called Splantzia and used to be the Turkish part of Chania. Its a maze of narrow streets and interesting houses, many built in the ruins of more ancient structures and a fun place to get lost in. The centerpiece of the neighborhood is Splantzia Square on Kalistou Street, and the Monastery of Agios Nikolaos which was built sometime in the 14th century. It was later converted to a mosque and a minaret was added, which still stands. It is now an Orthodox church.

If you walk uphill you will come to Kasteli and on the way pass remnants of the old wall, much of it used as walls for later buildings. You will also see the Minoan excavations on Kanevaro Street, covered by a large structure to keep out the rain. The small street west of the archaeological site will lead you past the Monastery Pension which is built in the ruins of the Dominican Nunnery of Santa Maria Dei Miracoli, built in 1615 and destroyed by German bombs. It was these same bombs that exposed Minoan pottery shards and led to the excavation of the ancient city of Kydonia, which until then its whereabouts were unknown. At the peak of Kasteli is the former Venetian Palace complex which became a prison under the Turks and is currently the Polytechnic. Through the gate on your left you come to a large parking lot and the Government House, built in 1898 by the Great Powers in the period between Crete’s independence from Crete and union with Greece. It is now occupied by squatters. The Palace of the Rector of which little exists was on the western side of the square at the top of Lithinon Street. From the edge of the square you have fine view of the old harbor and the town. The whole area is full of interesting buildings, some of which escaped the wrath of the German bombs and some which didn’t and are now garden walls and property boundaries.

Between Kasteli, Splantzia and Evraiki is the area where most of the small shops are located. Skrydloff Street also known as Leather Street which becomes Tsouderon was known for its shops that made the stivanania the boots that were the preferred footwear of the Cretan men up until the middle of the last century. There are still a small number of these shops left but mostly the street is something like Pondrossou Street in the Monastiraki neighborhood of Athens, full of tourist shops, clothing and the Cretan Knife shops that the island is also known for. Across Halidon is the Catholic Church of Saint Francis with its beautiful little courtyard and a statue of the Saint. The Folklore Museum, the Municipal Art Gallery and the Archaeological Museum, which also has a beautiful courtyard full of antiquities are all on the same street. A block north of Leather Street is the Orthodox Church of the Metropolitan, also known as the Trimartyri. During the Turkish period it was turned into a soap factory owned by Mustapha Pasha Naili whose son fell down a well and prayed to the Virgin that he be saved. When indeed he was saved he gave the factory back to the Christians to be used as a church again. It was renovated in 1897 by Czar Nicholas of Russia and became the metropolitan cathedral of Chania. Right next to the square is an old Hamam that has been converted into shops.

If you are standing at the front of the Demotiki Agora (Municipal Market) with your back to the market you will be looking at the New Town and it will be obvious because its mostly apartment buildings and there is a lot of traffic. If you have gotten used to life in the old town then life in the new town will be slightly alarming and you may find yourself running back in terror to the quiet narrow streets of Splantzia. But there are some things worth seeing in the New Town, not that I saw them all but trust me when I tell you that people who write guidebooks don’t go to every single place they write about, nor do they eat at every restaurant they review.

One of the best ways to get an understanding of the difference between the old and new town is by climbing the western walls of the old town behind the Jewish Quarter to where you can see the Venetian moat which in 2009 they were in the process of restoring which will impress your kids if they are not impressed with Chania already. The most important reason for a tourist to go to the New Town is to appreciate the Old Town. But there are reasons you may have to go to the New Town like for instance if you are taking a bus somewhere. The KTEL Bus Station is at the intersection of Kidonias and Partheniou Kelaidi streets, a block west of 1865 Square which is sort of the center of town, where old men play tablis (backgammon) or cards and newly arrived immigrants looking for work sit while they try to get their bearings and wonder why they ever left home. Another reason you may be in the New Town is because your travel agent booked you here or you booked yourself in one of the big modern hotels because it looked nice on the website. That’s OK. You can easily walk to the Old Town from most of the central hotels.

If you have kids a good reason to go to the New Town is to visit the Municipal Gardens, created by Reouf Pasha in 1870 where you can see a few of the remaining kri-kri, the Cretan wild goats that used to be quite plentiful. Or you can feed the ducks in the pond or grab your child and run from the geese when they are in attack mode or watch the male peacocks show off for the females. Or you can see the biggest rubber plants you have ever seen, or have a coffee in the shade at the cafe. If it is summer you can go to the outdoor Cinema, and set your watch by the giant clock, built in 1927. If you are a runner who is not happy unless he is going in circles you can cross the street and visit the stadium sandwiched between Andreas Papandreou and Eleftherios Venizelos streets, two of Greece’s greatest Prime Ministers. If you walk up Papandreou street past the Turkish clock tower you can go to Platia Venizelos to the Nomarchia, the government building for the prefecture of Chania which is also the courthouse. Originally it was built as a military hospital in the closing days of Turkish rule.

If you walk along the shore of Koum-Kapi the old Turkish neighborhood outside the eastern walls and now where the youth of Chania congregate in the many cafes and continue to where Tsilivaki meets Eleftherios Venizelos Street you will come to Halepa, the upper class neighborhood that features the home of Eleftherios Venizelos, built by his father in 1880 on Venizelos Square which contains the Eleftherios Venizelos National Research Foundation. On the way you will pass the Politechnic University, another impressive building, and the Palace, the residence of the High Commissioner of Crete, Prince George. The Russian-looking church of Saint Magdalene is also on the same street while further on his the Church of the Evangelists on Romanov Street. For those with a car you can continue on to the base of the Akrotiri Peninsula which separates the city of Chania from Souda Bay where the ferry comes in by following signs to the airport until you come to the Venizelos Graves where he and his son Sophocles Venizelos, another Prime Minister of Greece are buried. In a spot chosen before hand by Venizelos himself as his final resting place, where you have a view of the entire city of Chania. You can also go for a coffee at Koukouvagia, which means owl, a popular hangout for students and another amazing view of Chania.

Last of all is Nea Hora which is west of the Old Town along the coast which is a must for anyone who loves seafood. From here the beaches get better and better leading out to the western suburbs of the city where the Hotel Ammos is located. For those staying here you can walk into Chania in 45 minutes beach by beach. For those staying in the Old Town just keep walking until you find a beach you like. If it is a fish taverna you are seeking try Psarotaverna Manos, which we did. It has fresh fish, lots of mezedes and is one of the closest to the Old Town. Another reason to go to the New Town is because this is where to find all the larger shops that won’t fit into a small Venetian building. Supermarkets, big electronic stores like Kotsobolos, department stores and clothing shops that the locals use are scattered around the downtown area. There are also a large number of real neighborhood restaurants and old man style cafeneons which in terms of food and atmosphere may be more authentic than what you will find in the Old Town which, lets face it, is a tourist town, though if not the best in Greece, close to it. If you are like me and always searching for that perfect place where one old guy serves coffee and raki and simple mezedes prepared by his wife to his friends you are more likely to find it in the New Town than the Old.

Where to head next?

Continue your journey to the top Greek destinations! After Chania, the must-visit spots include Heraklion and Rethymno in Crete, along with other stunning islands like the famous Santorini and beautiful Karpathos.
Heraklion and Rethymno are accessible by land, while other islands can be reached by ferry from Heraklion’s port.

Tastes of Chania walking tour

This is an escorted privileged walking tour, where you will visit a few authentic spots in Chania Old Town....

Stand-up paddleboard and snorkeling tour

Marathi's and Loutraki's crystal clear and calm waters create the perfect environment for you...

Chania sightseeing tour

The famous Red Sightseeing Bus has now come to Chania, the most beautiful town of Crete!...
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