Nature

Bonda beach (or Grias Pidima) is located 49km southeast of Agios Nikolaos and 14km east of Ierapetra, in the territory of the village Schinokapsala, between the seaside settlements of Agios Panteleimonas and Ahlia. Just below the main road connecting Ierapetra to Makrygialos, you will meet this small beach with rocks in places, totally secluded and ideal for isolation, compared to other beaches of the area. The is accessed through a small plateau near the main road.

The arid and barren province of Ano Mirabello water is scarce and especially in older times it was the biggest problem of people. Lack of springs forced people to store rain water. Thus, every village stored rainwater in cisterns or large open wells. In some cases, especially in small plateaus (called pogles) the tanks had the size of a small lake.

Thousands of visitors, descending the Samaria gorge, reach Agia Roumeli every day and enjoy their bath in the main beach, Gialos, stretching in front of the taverns. However, there are some very nice and quiet beaches around, one could explore. One of these beaches is Mashali and is actually the west part of the bay of Agia Roumeli.

In the central point of the massif of White Mountains we meet the peak Sternes with a maximum altitude of 2335 meters. This is the eighth highest peak of the White Mountains. The importance of Sternes is that it is located right in the center of the range, between a sea of peaks and thus from the top you can enjoy almost all the major peaks of the White Mountains.

Almost all villages of central Rethymnon have an oak grove around. The oak trees are inherent in the landscape of central Rethymno and consist a very important green lung in the heart of the island. One of these forests is met at position Sochores by village Fotinos.

Between the monastery of Panagia Koudoumas and the Cape Martelos there are imposing vertical cliffs with beautiful striped formations, known as Aspes (don't confuse with the popular Aspes beach). At the base of the cliffs three small beaches with crystal blue waters and pebbles are formed, which are only accessible by boat, as there is no access by any trail.

The peak of Vigla is located at an altitude of 907 meters and is one of the lowest peaks of the mountain range of Psiloritis. it is located just above the village of Ano Loutraki of Malevyzi province. Despite its small height, it has very steep slopes and rises abruptly above the village and the tallest of the two peaks is a quite sharp limestone ridge.

The surrounding area of the old and deserted monastery Kaloeidena near Ano Meros is dominated by rich vegetation of plane trees, watered by a large water spring. But the tree that stands out is the plane tree of Kaloeidena just above the spring as it is the oldest of all the trees that surround the monastery, but it is also the most impressive tree of the whole region and can be listed to the monumental trees in Crete.