In October 2015 Peter Trescher walked all the E4 Cretan Way in 22 days. Here is his interesting blog. He made a fantastic GearList, never saw something similar! And then there’s the story of his walk.
https://purcellhiker.wordpress.com/e-4-crete-log/research-and-resources/
Hiya Luca. I’ve just got back from Crete. I really enjoyed my thru-hike of the Cretan Way and was surprised how varied the landscape was. It’s a tough hike and in my opinion it’s equal to the GR20 in Cosica in both toughness and beauty. I found there were more opportunities for grabbing a bite to eat and buying food enroute on the western half of the hike… the eastern half the villages seemed to be smaller and very quiet. It took me 11 days starting at Kato Zakros. I camped in olive groves, on the side of hills either side of The Whites, and on the sandy beach at Paleochora. So, I overnighted at Christopigi, Prina, Agios Geogios, Archanes, Zaros, Fourfouras, Agios Ionnis, Askfendou, 1 hour short of the Kallergi Refuge, and Paleochora. The highlights for me were the stretch between Zakros and Ziros, the vineyards in the Archanes area, listening to a practice session from an eight-piece traditional greek band in Archanes early on a Friday evening, listening to hundreds of sheep and goat bells clanging and tinkling after sundown at Asfendou, snow in The Whites, seeing the blue blue sea appear on the horizon on the approach to Sougia, and eating like a king in a taverna in Paleochora. All in all it is a top top hike and I will cherish the memories.
I generally hike between 11 and 13 hours a day non-stop. I don’t sit down and admire the views but I do look around a lot and just keep moving. 30 mile day’s are fairly standard for me. I hiked the GR20 with alpine variants in 8 days and then hiked back on the standard GR20 in 6 days. In the USA I solo thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in 14 weeks, the Pacific Crest Trail in 15 weeks and the Continental Divide Trail in 15 weeks so I’m well conditioned to big hikes and long days. It’s not a race… it’s just what I like to do. I’m usually on the trail between 6:00 and 6:30am and make the most of the early morning coolness. The intense heat begins at around 9:00am and stays until around 7:00pm. I like to set-up tent at least an hour before sundown so that I can kick back and read for a while… but no earlier in case I’m found hiding in the olive groves by the farmer! I’m a light weight hiker. I wear Salomon Spreedcross 3 trail runners, carry a one-man tent and leave the stove at home. Only carry what you’ll be needing on a daily basis. I no longer use hiking sticks as I keep better posture and balance without them and because they have given me over-use injuries in the past. I train before hiking by carrying a fully loaded rucksack on day hikes (7 – 15 miles) on the weekends and running between 4 and 8 miles every other day for a month or so as warm up. Essential items are odour proof socks and t-shirts, a light weight cap, sun glasses to protect against glare in snowy conditions, and a small tube of sunscreen, packets of kleenex and baby wipes. Some people use vasoline to help with chaffing! I used a Samsung Galaxy S4 for storing the Anavasi maps and the GPX/KTM files and for storing photos. I took along 2 x Ankar Astro battery packs which store enough charge to charge the S4 4 times between them. I also took along a 4 port USB wall charger.
Thank you so much for putting together the guide book and providing the GPX files. I also downloaded the 3 Avanasi maps for Crete onto my smartphone. I had to convert the GPX files to KTM so that they were compatible with the Anavasi maps. The GPS came in very handy on some of the shortcuts, where the route was sometimes a little overgrown or not so obvious, and especially in The Whites. It is sometimes a little difficult to differentiate a footpath from a farm accessway on the ground and the weldmesh fences make it difficult to hike cross country to regain the trail after having made a navigational error… so I was a bit twitchy at times and probably used the GPS more than was necessary at times!
May was very hot… probably up around 27°C, however the wild flowers were at their best and it was clear blue skies for most of the trip. Crete had heavy snow back in January and so there was still a lot of snow up in the mountains. I spent 8 hours traversing steep snowy slopes up in The Whites and there were no other footprints up there which was nice. Water was scarce in The Whites. Towards the end of The Whites I did walk through a snowy plain (flat bottomed valley) which had a great number of pits/pools full of ice cold water/snow run off which I was grateful for. I saw a bit of wildlife… a badger and golden orioles, squacco heron, purple heron, hoopoe, chukar partridge, common cuckoo, common linnet, black cap, grey shrike, alpine chough, stonechat, white wagtail, crag martin and a raptor of sorts carrying a snake.
Anyway, thanks again Luca for your help and I wish you success with the guide book. It may benefit some hikers to know what facilities are in the villages the trail pass through eg super markets, small village shops, tavernas etc with opening times as it would help some in planning ahead.
Ciao
Nick Burley
Nick Burley at the Golden Step
The White Mountains or Lefka Ori is the largest mountain range in the island of Crete, consisting of dozens of peaks over 2000m of altitude. They are made of limestone and called White Mountains because they are covered in snow until late in the spring. Watch Christine Schmitthenner’s video (2010) featuring parts of the Cretan Way:
Nice video, about a thru-hike on the Cretan Way in 22 days, august 2016. Made by Jaroslav Smékal, a 21 years old from Czech Republic.
Here is the web version of the Kathimerini news, there’s also a video!
Written by Giorgos Lialios, photos and video by Enri Canaj.
http://www.kathimerini.gr/900221/interactive/epikairothta/ereynes/apo-tis-alpeis-ston-yhloreith
Jimmy walked with me in West Crete in 2012, this is a short video of a crazy game, running on the big dune…
Nice to get letters like this!
Dear Luca,
I have just come across your Cretan Walk Website and the book that you are planning to publish on it. I am thrilled and want to get my hand on an English Version as soon as possible. Please let me know when and how I will be able to buy it.
My wife Silvia and I are passionate walkers and are planning a long distance track from March 2016 to October 2016, starting in Crete, continuing via the E4 on Peloponnese, then via ferry crossing from Patras to Bari, then using the newly established Archangel Michael’s Way to trek Gargano and Abruzzi (hope that your Refugio is on that route;-), then ferry again from Civitavecchia to reach GR 20 on Corsica and on to Marsaille (E 4) to Andorra and GR 10 … and, so god willing, maybe Portugal in the end. Most of the routes are coming together slowly. The only ones I am still struggling with is how to best get from the Archangel Michael Trail to Civitavecchia (for the ferry to Corsica) and the E4 on the Peloponnese, which seems to be difficult to find due to lack of marking as well as guidebooks. It would be great if you had any information on those that you could share or point me towards.
Thanks in advance for your response,
Klaus
At the end we manage it! We’ll be out with the official book “The Cretan Way. 28 days of walk on the E4” in March 2016. And this blog will change soon, be in touch!
Bruno is a friend from Belgium, a man that loves Crete deeply, like us! He sent this nice video, an unusual Crete with a lot of snow, Bruno with mark they went to walk to the top of Lefka Ori and they have to dig, to dig a lot, to find the small huts where to sleep… fantastic and incredible landscapes!
This man is Eftichis. He works in Samaria Gorge as a Forest Guard since the 90s. One of the most interesting people you can meet in Samaria. Always welcome and kind, speaking English, he is the responsible of Samaria village area. He loves the gorge an he likes to take care of the village, the buildings, the field, and the kri-kri, the wild goats or Agrimi (like the one in the picture). His parents were from there, before the village was evacuated in the creation of the National Park.
This guy is the right person in the right place! Something difficult to find in Greek public service!
We tell you this story because we decided to give him the prize as “CamminaCreta special person”. And we gave him a pair of Scarpa mountain boots. Scarpa gave us some shoes to give during the walk to special persons, we waited to give the last one to find the right person. We waited more than one year, but now we are proud of this, Eftichis is very happy of his new shoes and of this acknolegment.
So, if you walk in Samaria Gorge, and you see him in Samaria village, you can stop for a while and talk with this man, could be a very interesting meeeting.
THE CRETAN WAY 