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Base: Marina of Heraklion, Crete, Greece
Skippered Charters: min time frame: half - day
Bareboat Charters: min time frame: 4 nights
Agia Pelagia (Santa Pelagia) is a popular seaside resort 23 km northwest of Crete's capital, the city of Heraklion. Its name comes from the homonymous church, in the Monastery of the Sabbatians.
Some 50 years ago Agia Pelagia was a tiny fishing village and a place for the residents of nearby Achlada village to grow their crops.
Today, the village, built at the center of a picturesque amphitheatric bay, has been transformed into a bustling tourist resort featuring a 7 - stars hotel, a bunch of 5 - stars hotels, traditional seaside tavernas, cafes, bars, internet cafés, ATMs, souvenir shops.
For adventure lovers there are lots of options available like hiking, mountain bicycling, sea bicycling, canoeing, water skiing, jet skiing, snorkeling, fishing, scuba diving etc.
Actually visitors can find every facility needed to support any kind and style of vacation.
Overview
Base: Marina of Heraklion, Crete, Greece
Skippered Charters: min time frame: half - day
Bareboat Charters: min time frame: 4 nights
Surrounded by mountains and hills, Agia Pelagia Bay area lies right in the middle of Crete (which makes it easy to be used as a base for tours and excursions around the island).
The landscape is actually complex of 8 wind – protected, formidable, sandy coves named Mades, Vlychada, Lygaria, Agia Pelagia, Fylakes, Kladissos, Psaromoura and Mononaftis.
The Bay area complex also includes a number of smaller, hidden beaches, protected coves, and tiny coastline details often unreachable other than by boat. There are many special places only boaters know about and only boaters can get to.
It is exceedingly difficult to describe in words the extravagant, Caribbean-like landscape. Always calm, tropical aquamarine waters, palm trees, golden sand, smooth rocky platforms laying into the shallow waters (hopefully you may view part of the astonishing beauty in the following photo gallery).
It’s nothing but strange that one of the top luxurious resorts worldwide (named Out of the Blue, one of the very few 7 stars hotels in Greece) is built there.
Landscape
Agia Pelagia
Base: Marina of Heraklion, Crete, Greece
Skippered Charters: min time frame: half - day
Bareboat Charters: min time frame: 4 nights
The first major excavations at Agia Pelagia were carried out at Cape Souda, near Evresi Cave, by Sir Arthur Evans.
It was archaeologist Stylianos Alexiou, along with Dr. Athanasia Kanta, who performed the majority of later research. Alexiou and others put forward the hypothesis that Agia Pelagia was the site of ancient Panormos, also known as Avlopotamos.
At the north end of Agia Pelagia Bay, remnants of excavations of the Hellenistic town of Apollonia can still be seen.
The legendary archaeologist John Pendlebury classified the surface findings that were discovered at Agia Pelagia as "implied" proof of a late Minoan settlement there.
Post - Minoan graves and the University (Prytaneon) of the 4th century BC were found in 1970 at the site "Kladistos" or "Kladotos".
A nearby cave, with the name "Evresi", was the place where - according to the legend - local people found the icon of Agia Pelagia.
All around the Agia Pelagia Bay area there are outcrops of a special kind of blue - green schist rock which was quarried and used to pave streets and floors of Minoan palaces between 1700 and 1600 BC.
History
Image Gallery / Location
