Europe’s oldest town and its treasures are Crete’s must-see attraction

Twenty years ago, when my energy levels were higher and my sightseeing philosophy more American, I was appalled when friends came back from Crete without visiting any of its cultural attractions. How could you travel to the birthplace of European civilisation and not pay homage to its remains?

Now, drained by exhaustion, deprived for too long of sun and sand, and ensconced in a luxury resort to fix both, I had a bit more empathy for those I once condemned. But only a bit. No matter what else happened … or didn’t … on this holiday, I had to make it to Knossos.



For those less enchanted by the ancient world than I: Knossos was the capital of ancient Crete and a civilisation we call the Minoans. We don’t know what they called themselves, because we still haven’t deciphered their writing. But archaeology tells us they were remarkably sophisticated, building cities that were not only lavishly beautiful but precision-engineered with running water, complex architecture and efficient food storage facilities. Evidence of international trade and influences in their art tells us they were cosmopolitan types who did business across, and welcomed citizens of, the known world. And they appear to have been, if not entirely matriarchal, a society that respected and treated women similarly to men.

No civilisation in Europe would reach such glory for 1000 more years. (And it would take everyone a lot longer on the female empowerment front.) Which is perhaps why Crete shows up so often in Greek myth. The birthplace of Zeus. Honeymoon spot of Zeus and Europa and home to their descendants. Home of the Minotaur, the Labyrinth and the world’s first super-inventor, Deadalus, who built the maze beneath the palace to keep the bull-headed monster restrained. The ruins of the palace at Knossos are so labyrinthine that archaeologists point to them as proof of some historical reality in the tales.

Today’s Knossos is a 1,400 square metre archeological site five kilometres outside of Heraklion, the island’s capital. Admission is €15 (€20 for a combined ticket that also gets you into the Heraklion Archeological Museum) and you are free to wander on your own, though I would highly recommend a guide to help you understand what you are looking at. 

We travelled with “Get Your Guide” on their tour from Agios Nikolaos. I had hoped to find the sort of combination driver and guide, hireable on a day rate, I once used in Athens. But equivalent services aren’t available here and a taxi for the day would have been exorbitant. The tour, officially originating in the town 20 minutes from our resort but picking you up at your hotel, had the disadvantage of a two-hour meander through resort areas before and after, since our starting point of Domes of Elounda was furthest away. But we rode in comfort, the six hours spent touring were expertly guided and we got in to Heraklion as well as Knossos. It’s a bargain at £31 per person; admission to the attractions is separate.. 

The ruins at Knossos are so magnificent because of an early 20th century preference for putting things back together. The practice is much frowned upon these days, and there’s a suspicion amongst modern scholars that the legendary archaeologist Arthur Evans might have been a bit overly imaginative with his reconstructions, but his efforts bring the site to life. Distinctive Minoan columns, wider at the top than at the bottom and painted a striking oxblood red, hold up lintels and walls. Murals are re-created in all their opulent, vivid glory. Processional staircases descend in stately grandeur. Enormous, highly decorated storage jars stand ready for wine or olive oil. Some of the most important rooms (at least, the ones Evans thought were most important) have been almost completely reconstructed and furnished, though sadly the queen’s apartments with their famous dolphin murals were closed due to the inability to ensure social distancing in cramped spaces.

The Minoans preferred small rooms, but plenty of them, connected by doors and transoms that could be shuttered for privacy or opened to let air and people flow. Knossos contained multiple levels of these cubist warrens, rising around a massive central courtyard now flooded with tourists. (Given that visitor numbers are still down due to COVID, it’s frightening to imagine how packed this site must be in a normal high season.) While it’s known as a palace, it’s much more like a small town and probably housed an equivalent population.



One of the best places to see the sophistication of the site is from the top of a heavily reconstructed light well, where a broad staircase descends through three stories of colonnaded loggias. To one side, you can appreciate the grandeur of the central court, while on the other you see the palace’s excavated levels, falling away down the hillside like the open face of a doll’s house. It’s not hard to see why anyone would associate this with the labyrinth.



Just a few decades ago, our guide Poppy told me, all areas of the site were open for visitors to just wander at their leisure. Global tourism numbers don’t allow that any more. This is the second-most visited attraction in Greece after the Parthenon and crowds were starting to do damage, so these days you explore a set tourist path with many avenues blocked so you can only look from a distance. What those blocked passageways took away, Poppy gave back with her clear explanations of what happened where, how the Minoans lived, the story of the site’s rediscovery and reconstruction, and the latest theories about this still-mysterious ancient society.

As magnificent as it is, the palace at Knossos is an unfurnished shell of a building. For the complete picture, you need to get to the museum in Heraklion. Where you’ll also see the magnificent wooden model of the palace at its height. (It’s a shame there’s not a version of this on the actual site, for those who don’t have time to do both.) Just to complicate things … the museum holds artefacts from across all of Knossos’ 7,000-year history and treasures from other palaces around Crete. So don’t imagine these galleries as exact furnishings of the place at one point in time. But what you see here, in a way the ruins only hint at, is staggering sophistication, joyous use of colour and an exuberance for life. 

Pottery, jewellery and murals last in regular use 3,500 years ago seem comfortingly modern. The enormous jar with the cheerful, writhing octopus would look magnificent in my garden. The famous dolphin mural would fit right onto the wall of any beach resort (and no doubt does in a thousand copies). The magnificent turquoise and cobalt pattern in that Minoan’s kilt would make a mouthwatering dress. All those examples of the goldsmith’s art would grace any modern neck or hand. And, thanks to plenty of jewellers in town turning out reproductions, they do. I had always been an admirer of Minoan art, but seeing it gathered in such profusion makes me think they just might have had the best design sensibility of any civilisation in the ancient western world.

Beyond the museum, Heraklion is a sometimes charming, often undistinguished sprawl. (Nothing I saw in Crete persuaded me away from an opinion formed on an early trip to the mainland that, for such a historic country, Greece is sadly dominated by ugly, run-down 20th century buildings.) The most noteworthy site in Heraklion is the old Venetian fort, sitting at the end of a long causeway guarding the harbour. It’s particularly beautiful on a sunny day when its white stone gleams against the blue of sea and sky. There’s a Venetian lion fountain in the centre of the shopping district that would be more magnificent it it weren’t wedged in between cafes, mobile phone shops and tourist tat vendors. A couple of historic churches offer themselves up for exploration, but centuries of use as mosques under the Ottomans before they were re-purposed for the modern age left neither the glories of Islamic nor Byzantine art. There’s nothing here worth going out of your way for.

Heraklion does have a good range of shops, from big names and luxury brands to market traders, jewellers and local crafts. All of which confirms that if you can only bother to leave your resort once, this is the tour to take. You get all the culture and history of the Minoans, plus the chance to pick up any souvenirs and gifts you might need. Just make sure you have a good book for that long bus ride on either side of the tour.

Speaking of books … if you’re heading to Crete and want a list of relevant reading, I highly recommend the following:

• Mary Renault’s The King Must Die. The story of Theseus and the Minotaur, told as a ripping and plausible adventure by one of the greatest interpreters of the ancient world in fiction. A particularly fabulous imagining of what all the tributes and bull leaping might have been about. I had to read this in high school and was delighted to find an audio version from BBC Radio 4 before the trip.

• Jodi Taylor’s Plan for the Worst. I adore the time travelling historians of the Chronicles of St. Mary’s and couldn’t believe my luck when the next one on my reading list (no. 11 in the series) reached its climax in Knossos on the day the volcano at Thera blew apart Minoan society. Tour guide Poppy explained that modern theories think the immediate devastation and tidal wave wasn’t as bad as described in the book, but the imagined cataclysm makes for one hell of a page turner.

• Stephen Fry’s Mythos and Heroes. The first covers foundation stories and a basic who’s who in the Olympian world, the second … as its name implies … tells the adventurous tales of big names like Heracles and Jason. In classic Stephen Fry style, he mixes delightfully every day language and plenty of humour with insightful observations that will have you pondering deeper issues.

Everyone in the tourist industry on Crete recommends Victoria Hislop’s The Island. Even though I spent every day of my holiday looking out at the former leper colony and Venetian fort of Spinalonga that’s at the heart of the novel, it’s set in modern times. And anyone who knows me knows that I’m not going to waste my precious holiday reading time on anything set after 1815. When she does a prequel about what happened on the Island when the Ottomans wrested it from the Venetians, I’ll check it out.

Luxury and lethargy in a land of legend

Anyone who knew me at age 10 would be astonished that it has taken me nearly five additional decades to get to the Greek islands. I was obsessed with Greek myths as a child. 

At the age of eight I had stumbled across my mother’s high school textbook: Myths and their Meaning. This worthy, old-fashioned little book should have been well above my reading level. But the magic of the stories triumphed over the lack of pictures and the academic writing. I was hooked. I gobbled up stories of gods and heroes, their adventures, temples and cities, until I knew the details the way other children knew the names of dinosaurs or kept track of Barbie’s friends and accessories.

Children without siblings often have imaginary friends; that mine were demigods, fauns, nymphs and priestesses of Athena was no doubt decidedly odd. Had my older self not been distracted by journalism and English history, I like to think I might have come up with Percy Jackson and the Olympians before Rick Riordan. But life intervened, other passions entered my life and other holiday destinations clamoured for attention.

This year, The Fates intervened. Not the traditional Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos, but the British government, the Greek tourism board and employers who’d had us both at Sisyphean tasks throughout the pandemic. Finding a holiday destination that was open to British travellers and met our dual needs of complete relaxation and a memorable 10th wedding anniversary trip was fiendishly difficult. Six other options had failed to clear the Olympic hurdles. So here we were.

“Here” is a magical bit of Mirabello Bay in northeastern Crete. Sheltered by the islands of Kalydon and Spinalonga, this long, narrow inlet is framed by steep hills; like a fjord that’s drifted into hot and sunny seas. These hefty breakwaters mean this bit of the bay is calm and ideal for swimming, and the view in every direction is spectacular. And I mean jaw-dropping, heart-stoppingly spectacular. Glittering cobalt and turquoise waters. Majestic mountains. The romantic ruins on Spinalonga. Luxury villas built into the hillside with more than a touch of Bond villain lair about them. All shifting constantly as the light changes throughout the day. 

This is all much easier to appreciate, of course, from the welcoming luxury of  a five-star resort. Our home for 13 nights is Domes of Elounda, an Autograph Collection (Marriott) property that’s actually … despite its name … in easy walking distance of Plaka. I’ll do a full review in a later entry; this story is simply meant to set the scene.

The resort climbs up two sides of a steep hill beside the bay, sprawling through several sections with a variety of pools, restaurants and styles. Our room is at the crest of the hill, in one of three long, low lines of stone buildings that channel the simple square huts along Plaka’s harbour, but descend in a straight architectural line from the bold yet simple squares and rectangles of ancient Minoan ruins. Built from the local stone, they merge organically into a landscape of rust, ochre, gray and olive. 

Their interior, however, is a very long way from the simple structures they mimic. Ours has a private patio and plunge pool, perfect for the initial rest and recovery mission of this trip. In our first few days, we barely had the energy to leave the room. And we didn’t need to. Sleep. Stagger to private pool. Turn face to sun. Drink in landscape. Heal me,  Gaia and Helios.

The silence is extraordinary. Though the resort was full in our first week and at more than 80% for our second, the design and the hilltop position whisks sound away. At least human sounds. The wind is a different matter.

Our first few days were hot and still. Not a cloud drifted over the sky. Nothing moved. The heat, when not enjoying the benefits of cool water, was intense. The bay was a placid lake. How did Odysseus spend 10 years blundering through this? Even becalmed and rowing couldn’t have been that tough. And then the winds started.

Our fourth day was cloudy day with a bit of rain, a much appreciated pause from the sun. The wind swept the heat haze away, gave us even better views and stayed with us even when the sun returned. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it. It will be still, and then a gust will hit you with force, then disappear as fast as it came. On the beach, the breeze is mostly gentle. But gusts will dive into the bay, driving geysers of spray before them and whitecaps below. For the first time I understood why the horse was associated with Poseidon. These strange effects on the bay were positively equine. 

On our hilltop, the gusts are fierce. And puzzling. I’m used to ripping gales on Dartmoor or Chicago’s skin-shredding winds. I associate wind with bad weather. Here, the sun is shining and the sea is turquoise. The wind seems contrary. Odysseus, forgive me for underestimating you. There’s no way I’d want to sail in this. Most interestingly, the Cretan winds make different noises. Some howl mournfully. Some sing in a comforting bass. They have personality. No wonder the Greeks had four different and distinct gods of the wind. (I’m hoping for a little more Zephyros and a bit less Boreas in our final days.)

I’m not sure the rest of Crete is so magical or mythic. An excursion to Knossos (which I’ll write about next) took us through beach resorts on the north coast between Malia and Heraklion to pick up fellow travellers, and confirmed that our little it of the island is quite exceptional. 

The destination might have been accidental, but the results are just what Aesculpius ordered. My 10-year-old self isn’t surprised. If Crete was good enough to host the birth and early years of Zeus himself, why wouldn’t it offer a healing, memorable holiday. Pass me the cornucopia along with a bit more sun cream, please. 

England’s Gusbourne and Hambledon take on the great Champagne houses

What makes Champagne special?

It’s not the bubbles. Many beyond the designated area of Champagne use the méthode traditionelle to produce sparkling wine from the same grape varieties. Many are just as good as what can officially be called “Champagne”, and some are both better and less expensive. Cynics might say the differentiation comes simply from the marketing that preserves the word Champagne for the production of just one region in France. But people who really know wine will talk about terroir: a unique combination of soil composition, growing conditions and weather patterns that imprints a distinctive taste onto the grapes.

But is Champagne’s terroir unique? Winemakers along a swathe of Southeast England argue a definitive “non”! 

The exact same ridge of chalk that lies beneath the Champagne region extends across the English Channel and becomes the Downs of Kent, Sussex, and Hampshire. That mattered little when summers across the Downs were cold and wet. But in the past 20 years climate change has brought the conditions in Southern England much closer to those in Northern France. Longer, hotter summers bring grapes more reliably to their sweet maturity and drier autumns allow them to be harvested before they can be waterlogged or start to mildew. This leaves only the talent of the winemaker as a differentiator, and, as small vineyards across the Downs are proving in critical reviews, wine competitions and their places on top restaurant wine lists, they are the equals of their French cousins.

I had the joy of exploring two of them within a week of each other recently, giving me the chance for a delightful “compare and contrast” exercise.

Gusbourne and Hambledon share an obsession with quality, small batch production, private ownership and a coveted place on Berry Bros. & Rudd’s shelves. Both use only their own-grown grapes and see growing, harvesting, production and ageing as inseparable pieces of  a continuous process; each depends on the other, no one step is more important. Both adopt marketing strategies more familiar to Napa and Sonoma than the French, with carefully-crafted visitor experiences and wine clubs to build allegiances. Both produce wines that, in a blind taste test, would be indistinguishable by all but the most sensitive palates to fine Champagne. And both price their wines accordingly. These, like their French cousins, are special occasion wines, not cheap substitutes to be found on grocer’s bargain shelves.

In taste and visitor experience I give the slightest edge to Gusbourne, though its location in Appledore, Kent means it’s not close enough for me to be a regular visitor. (A highly convenient stop for anyone who’s going to and from the channel tunnel, however.) The vines date back to 2004 and the first wines appeared in 2006, though it’s in the ‘10s that the winery made its reputation. Gusbourne’s biggest differentiator is its decision to make only vintage wines. Though there is a house style, every year is slightly different, reflecting the weather and growing conditions. Their Blanc de Blanc is generally considered their masterpiece by critics and management alike, a Chardonnay-only sparkling wine with deep minerality, green apple and citrus notes and that wonderful essence of toasted toasted bread so typical in classic Champagnes.

My favourite, however, was their distinctive 2016 rose, which is an extraordinary, almost luminescent salmon pink colour and a gorgeous combination of soft red fruits on the tongue that hits a perfect balance between sweet and dry. I was also impressed by Gusbourne’s playful sense of experimentation. While Blanc de Blanc, rose and Brut Reserve are their perennial money spinners, they play around with still wines, or wines from just one field, when conditions suggest there might be something special worth creating.

While their tourism ambitions are newer than their wines, Gusbourne is clearly making a go at turning their vineyards into a “destination”. A modest but beautifully-designed building called The Nest is a visitor and tasting centre next to the working winery. A semi-permanent marquee next door is serving as a pop-up restaurant, with hopes for a permanent building to come. Throughout the vineyards they’ve installed … and continue to create … decks and open-sided marquees with space for picnics and special events. Visitors can bring their own picnics, buy a bottle and disappear into the vines on a self-guided tour, buy a picnic with wine or sign up for a full-on dining experience. 

While the views over sloping vineyards are pleasant at Gusbourne, they’re verging on the spectacular at Hambledon. The Cotswolds get the international nod as picture-postcard England, but I can make a strong argument for my adopted home county. Hampshire’s valleys are deeper, the forests thicker, the undulating countryside’s rolls gentler. The drive from Basingstoke to Gusbourne’s vineyards just north of Portsmouth is almost entirely rural, shade dappled lanes alternating with expansive views. The vineyard itself fills a gentle, green valley, with the house and winery near the crest of the hillside to take in the best views. 

Hambledon’s wines are a little less quirkily distinctive than Gusbourne’s, possibly because they don’t follow the vintage strategy. They’re also cheaper. If I wanted to serve a basic English sparkling wine made from the classic trio of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier at the start of a dinner party I would go for Hambledon’s classic cuvée at £30 rather than Gusbourne’s similar Brut Reserve at £39. 

Hambledon’s marketing USP is that it’s the oldest commercial vineyard in England. Which is true, but a technicality that has little to do with current production. The original vineyard dates back to the 1950s, when the founder asked his mate Winston Churchill for a favour and got the Pol Roger team to come to Hampshire to advise on winemaking, Back then, they suggested German-style, white table wines. The original family had lost interest in winemaking and the acreage under cultivation had shrunk by the time the current owner reinvented the place when he took over in 1999. He tested vines and winemaking in the ‘00s (including talking Pol Roger into a return consultancy gig), but didn’t start re-planting and producing in earnest until the 2010s. So while they can claim to be older, in every practical way Hambledon is actually a bit younger than Gusbourne.

The Hampshire vineyard may have deeper pockets, however. A beautiful new building is rising at the side of the old winery that already holds cellars beneath ground level and will soon grow to include a new tasting room and a fine-dining restaurant on the top floor that will have spectacular views over the valley. I feel another outing coming on … just need a boutique B&B in Hambledon village to recover from the effects of a sparking wine-based tasting menu