Having decided before travelling that a wake up call at 3.30 for a 16km hiking trip through the Samaria Groge was probably a bit too much like hard work – we’re on holiday, dammit – we made the winding 2.5 hour trip to the Deads Gorge at Zakros, 70 miles away instead. The 4km walk, part of the E4 trail,  over the rocks of the riverbed took around three hours in the warm sunshine.

That first picture, taken at Zakros beach reminds me of somethibng by Mark Rothko, though I’m sure soneone who actually knows about his work will correct me.

Views of the surroundings were quite spectacular, the bleating of the black goats echoing around the ravine. I was glad that we were doing this walk in May and not under the unforgiving August sun, but the scent of hunmocks of wild thyme, sage and oregano still made it a heady eperience. On the way we also encoutered wild delphinium and lots of different sorts of rocks, which I still need to identify.