Beautiful but dangerous in heat - The Samaria gorge itself was beautiful and well worth the trip to hike it. However, this excursion was unsafe. It was over 100 degrees Fahrenheit and since our group came from Heraklion, we had to finish the hike by a certain time in order to make the last boat. This did not feel feasible and the tour only provided a bus ride from Heraklion and back. I am in healthy condition and still ended up with heat stroke and dehydration. The tour should not have run in this heat and I did not feel taken care of by the staff.

Long day with lots of surprises, mostly not good ones - Let’s start with the positives. The walk is incredible. It really isn’t for the faint hearted, we saw several people coming out with bandaged knees, and it was willpower and stubbornness that kept me and my dodgy knees going. Obvious as it may seem, it is a really long walk but you have to keep looking down at the path rather than enjoying the scenery as the path is steep in the beginning and for most of its length has loose stones and/or slippery bits of stone to slide on or turn an ankle on. It is fabulous though and I’m glad I did it. Having sent our hotel address through when booking, and seeing that the advert said hotel pick up, we were sent a pick up point 1km away down the road. On top of the 16km walk. Well, the conditions did mention designated pick up points so I didn’t question it at the time, assuming this fitted in with the route and was normal. I particularly enjoyed seeing the bus coming towards us from the direction of our hotel. I became more annoyed thenceforth every time we stopped outside other hotels to pick more people up. We stopped as advertised outside Rethimno at a small taverna where you could buy breakfast, with another stop on the way to the gorge. On the way our guide informed us, amongst giving us the timings, that if we hurt ourselves we should not cry or go running to her as she wasn’t our mother! At the gorge, our tour guide stayed on the bus and left us to it, not what I was expecting at all. We didn’t see her again until the end before the ferry - granted it is 16km and easy to miss people but every time I’ve had a tour guide before they have been with us, guiding us on our tour. The first part of the walk is the really steep long descent, with amazing views - take time to savour them, don’t be put off by the warnings about not finishing in time and being left behind to make your own arrangements overnight. There are several basic toilets along the route and the spring water is freely available regularly to top up bottles. When we finally finished the walk, aching and tired, we sat in Aghia Roumeli with its shops and taverns. Didn’t buy anything to eat there as our guide had told us that we would be stopping in Rethimno to eat on the way home and didn’t want to ruin the appetite and was looking forward to exploring Rethimno. After the ferry, we went by bus back towards home. I was surprised when we drive past the first 2 posted signs to Rethimno, more surprised when I saw us driving away and really disappointed when we pulled into the same small roadside taverna with very little choice and 20 minutes to decide what to have, queue up, get the food, eat and use the toilet before rushing back to the bus. On the way back we stopped at everyone else’s hotel (except those in the centre of Heraklion) and finally we pulled over at our pick up point 1km from our hotel. To their credit, the guide and driver didn’t realise it was so far and drove us to the hotel, it was obviously on the way and I have no idea why it was necessary to make us walk 1km when the bus goes past the hotel door. It’s a really long day - left the hotel at 05:30 and got back at 22:45. I hurt, I’m glad I did it, it was organised with military precision but I felt that the communication is somewhat lacking. There are places to buy (with limited choice) breakfast, lunch and dinner. It would have helped me to know that the Rethimno stop was the taverna from earlier so I could have purchased a proper meal at the end of the walk rather than the very basic things on offer at that Taverna (effectively a small 1 skewer chewy meat kebab, a small pizza or a roll).