Crete is calling

A week from today our dateline will be Chania, Crete. A friend asked if I would share some of our tips for finding inexpensive accommodations, so here are some of the web sites we've used: http://www.paros-accommodations.com/ We stayed in a waterfront hotel in Paros (an island in the Greek Cyclades)for 40E per night that included a buffet breakfast in April 2008. A quick check of this web site this morning, showed nine listed that are available the end of this month ranging from 20 - 28E per night; and some are studios.

We also use http://www.venere.com/ which offers accommodations ranging from luxury to cheap places. Another favorite: http://www.greeka.com/

We usually double check http://www.tripadvisor.com/ to see what other travelers might have said about the place. While opinions can vary widely, if a place gets high ratings many times, we don't hesitate to book it. Such is the case with the Lefka Apartments we have booked in Chania. Trip Advisors comment that they couldn't believe a place was as good as that described by other travelers until they arrived and experienced it. We will report in after our arrival.

We also found on our last trip to Greece that people do wait at the ferry dock with hand-printed signs advertising rooms for rent at incredibly low prices. . .so armed with our web sites and sense of adventure, we are holding fast to the plan to have no reservations in Greece and no set island destination other than our first week in Crete (and that is because we knew we wanted to further explore Crete and would easily fill a week or more doing just that).