Cleo couldn’t help waving like a kid when she spotted some passengers pointing at them, and one of the men waved back, making her smile.
‘I wonder if they’re going to our village,’ she said, more to herself than anyone else.
‘Or maybe they’re going to hike the Samaria Gorge,’ Maya suggested.
‘What’s that?’ Cleo wanted to know.
‘It’s a giant canyon, sixteen kilometres long,’ Maya explained. ‘The longest gorge in Europe. It’s in a national park, with stunning forests and streams, and it ends at the Libyan Sea. I’d love to go there. It’s a shame we won’t have time on this trip.’
They stopped for a moment to have a drink of water, and the views from where they stood were breathtaking. However, Cleo was relieved when, after about an hour and a half, they started to descend at last.
On reaching the bottom of the mountain, they were soon strolling through the main street on the water’s edge, past numerous tempting-looking restaurants and souvenir shops.
‘I could murder an iced coffee,’ Tash announced, veering left onto the terrace of a café and plonking down at one of the tables. She didn’t bother to ask the others if they agreed, but they were all very much of the same mind.
‘God! Me too. I need caffeine,’ Cleo replied, before winking. ‘Henrietta will never know.’
‘Let’s share one of those Sfakian cheese pies, too,’ said Maya. ‘It’s a traditional dish.’
The pie was a dough made with flour and olive oil, filled with localMizithracheese, pan fried and served with a large dollop of Cretan honey. Tired, hungry and sugar-deprived as she was, Cleo thought she’d never tasted anything so good.
Afterwards, they explored the shops and tried on some of the brightly patterned dresses and loose, casual pants. Only Maya bought anything, however – a straw bucket hat which really suited her.
When they’d had enough, they decided to walk up the hill a little way to the ruins of a Venetian fort. Just below it stood an unusual memorial beneath which was an assortment of human bones, encased in glass.
The grinning skulls, bleached white by the sun, made Cleo shiver.
‘That’s macabre,’ she said. ‘I wonder who they were.’
Maya whipped a small guidebook out of her bag and flicked through until she found the relevant page. ‘It’s for twenty-six people from the village who were executed by the Germans in September 1941. They’d helped some Allied troops hiding in the district escape from Crete.
‘Apparently there’s also a memorial near the harbour that tells the story of the evacuation of ten thousand Allied soldiers by the Royal Navy. Many of the ones left behind surrendered and were sent to prison camps, while others were fed and sheltered by locals and joined the Cretan resistance movement. It says here the resistance fighters made a significant impact. They carried out guerrilla warfare in the mountains, sabotaged airfields and generally harassed the enemy. In return, the German meted out brutal punishments – massacring civilians and destroying whole villages.’
‘It’s hard to imagine all that drama and suffering in a beautiful, quiet little place like this,’ Tash commented, taking a moment to gaze at the bones, perhaps trying to picture the brave men to whom they once belonged. ‘I wonder what role the villagers played in Porto Liakáda, and whether Villa Ariadne was used for something, too.’
They were silent as they made their way back to the ferry port, lost in their own thoughts.
‘I didn’t have a clue about Crete before coming here,’ Cleo said, feeling slightly ashamed about her lack of knowledge. ‘I thought it was just a holiday destination where people came to sunbathe and have fun.
‘I’ll look at the locals differently from now on. I bet they’ve got some tales to tell about the war. I’d love to hear them, wouldn’t you?’
6
The atmosphere in Porto Liakáda when they arrived back took them by surprise. The sun was going down and twinkling lights shone in windows and around terraces along the entire length of the main street. Plus, the restaurants and bars were humming with people, and music and bursts of laughter filled the air.
It felt like fiesta time, but perhaps it was the same every Saturday night when the weather was good. Cleo, who’d thought the village was quiet and sleepy, blinked a few times in amazement at the brightness.
‘Shall we have a drink?’ Tash suggested, eyeing someone’s glass of wine on the table as they passed by. ‘A soft drink, of course,’ she added quickly. ‘Unless…’
‘Definitely.’ Maya marched over to a table in a corner, right by the sea, and pulled out a chair. ‘How about here?’
Having broken her diet once already today, Cleo was determined to be good and ordered a glass of orange juice. The others did the same. But when the waiter arrived with a bowl of olives, some rusks – local crisp breads, made with barley flour and dipped in olive oil – four shot glasses and a small jug of Cretan raki – the local brandy – on the house, all three lost their resolve.
‘We’ve got to at least try it,’ Cleo said, pouring out the clear liquid and passing her friends a glass each. ‘Cheers!’
She took a small sip and coughed. ‘Jesus!’ Her eyes were watering. ‘That’s strong!’
Tash pulled a face and pushed her glass away. ‘It tastes like petrol. I don’t like it.’
