ELOUNDA, CRETE[:]

Hello, darlings! I hope you’re doing well, sewing your Wanda trench coat! As for me, I’ve been feeling down, I’m really missing the sunshine here. These gray Parisian days literally make me want to hibernate. But heads up, after being away for a whole week, I think the sun is coming back to Paris’s sky! It better last, otherwise I’m going to start thinking about moving the Lemonade Studio down South. If you have any tips to re­energize when you’re lacking vitamin D, I’ll take ‘em!

Today I’d like to tell you about Crete, which was the second part of our honeymoon! We stayed for three days near Plaka, Elounda which is a little intro to this magnificent island! We loved the little fishing villages, the really fresh local cuisine, and the peaceful atmosphere all around, a real haven that almost made me want to convert to the “slow life”. But the more I think about it, the more I believe that Greece and it’s surrounding islands are the ideal place for a true vacation because it isn’t too far, there’s only one hour time difference, and it’s really a dream spot to relax and refresh yourself...

We got there with a speed boat from Santorini, it’s really easy to reserve it by internet. I took care of it a couple months ago, in less than two hours we were at Héraklion. There are also domestic flights that go back and forth several times a day but to be completely honest with you, we’re not big fans of heights! So here we were in Crete, which was really different from the little Cycladic islands. It’s barely smaller than Corsica, but it’s still big for an island... So we left the volcanic landscapes of Santorini for the mountains of Crete headed for the Blue Palace, aka paradise on earth alias “never going back to the city”.

It made me smile to read your comments about staying here for your honeymoons when I posted this photo of our room on Instagram. At that moment I knew that we were exactly where we should be! The hotel is huge, there’s even a funicular that goes down to the private pretty gray pebbled beach facing the Spinalonga Peninsula. I had never been to a hotel as incredible as this one, extremely well decorated with a very polite staff. You should check it out!

Even on Wikipedia they say that Spinalonga is the main activity on this part of the island. It was a fortress island built by the venetians in the 16th century and it’s incredible that it’s still in such good shape, I’m not even sure that you could call it remains everything is so well preserved. You can go to Spinalonga on a little boat that heads out once every hour from the little village of Plaka, right next to the hotel. I suggest going for a walk in the little fishing villages too to get a real feel for the local life, and to go grab a bite of seafood on the Elounda port...

We didn’t really explore the surrounding area, going places was always a bit of an adventure since we didn’t have our driver's license. These three days gave us a marvelous sneak peak and we’d love to go back now that everyone’s told us about the heavenly Balos lagoon and the village of Loutros that was just next to the place we were staying!

Here are a few treasures from Crete that I found in a tiny shell shop in Elounda! If you have any recommendations for Crete, please share them in the comment section! I’ll let you go, I’ll be back next week to write about the end of this trip with a special article on Athens! Until then, see you tomorrow!