Crete: Driving Tips

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Sir, your goats are blocking the road

My first visit to Crete was via Olympic Air from Athens on a vintage de Havilland aircraft, possibly a variant of the DH.141 Heron circa 1950, possibly the real thing. Either way, there was a certain Indiana Jones flight out of Cairo feel to it. I wondered at the time if a bright red line could be seen tracing our route on the surface of the Mediterranean below. Also, from my vantage point directly behind the pilot, I could clearly see the notice on the pilot’s screen that the navigation software license had expired in 1984. No worries, how far could Crete have moved in twelve or thirteen years?

Before going any further, I want to make it clear just how much I enjoyed Crete, because sometimes it may sound like I didn’t. I’ve been there twice now and I have every intention of visiting it again and again if I can. I sing its praises to anyone who asks and to quite a few people who didn’t ask. I love Crete. Given the choice I take it over Thira hands down. It’s more real.

Having said that, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention certain features of the island so that you know to pack plenty of patience and some extra sense of humor. Crete is the Texas of The Hellenic Republic. Natives of the island will sometimes emphasize their Creteness over their Greekness and until now I‘ve never heard a Greek emphasize anything over his Greekness, even if he was born in Bessemer, Alabama. Nevertheless, it is still as Greek as Pericles, olives, and sawdust bread. “It can wait” is still something of a national anthem, the major form of employment sill appears to be sitting in tavernas sipping the same Nescafe Frappe for hours on end, and the most prevalent agricultural product has to be women’s fashions. On this occasion, I’m going to focus on one particularly challenging aspect of traveling on Crete: driving. In a word, don’t.

In 2006 (the year of my first visit) Greece proudly led the European Union in traffic fatalities per capita. You may wonder how anyone can “proudly” lead anything in that category, but Greeks do everything proudly no matter what. It’s something of a habit. They proudly go to the latrine to proudly discover it’s out of service and then proudly yell at each other until their proud veins stand out on their proud faces. They also lead the EU (very proudly) in something called “traffic related homicides” which I take to mean road rage killings. On an island like Crete, where a common cause of death for men ages 18-24 is listed as “blood feud” and the national mania for driving as fast as possible at all times is amplified since it’s an island actually large enough to have some straight-aways, this feature can be pretty conspicuous. It’s not just the proud drivers, however. There are plenty of things stacking the deck against you if you get behind the wheel.

I found out a thing or two about why the Hellenes can boast of these statistics as a result of a natural inclination to avoid cruise ship stops and all-inclusive hotel package locations. Eastern Crete is loaded with them. Southwest Crete is mostly rocky desolate bits of nowhere. So brother Mark and I naturally grabbed an appliance alleged to be an automobile and hit the road. It was either that or “you take de feet.”

At first we made some effort to ascertain the rules of the road as they are in practice to discover that there aren’t any. There aren’t any. I mean…there aren’t any. Driving on the sidewalk is not only acceptable but obligatory. The road signs are all translated in the local dialect as “ignore this sign.“ Right of way is determined by who is the most determined, because everybody thinks he‘s right. “One Way” means “My Way.“ On “The New National Road” (Crete Route 1) somebody was pretty sure one lane wasn’t enough, but someone else thought two seemed excessive. So, in what must have been the compromise from an epic arms-in-the-air shouting match between two proud Greek civil engineers, there is a sort of half-lane on each side. This doesn’t really matter too much as all the lanes in the world can’t help you when it comes to the defining characteristic of driving on Crete: goats in the road.

Exhibit A is a pretty typical example of what you’re going to encounter if you take to the streets. This, if you interpret the blue sign with the arrows going in a circle to mean “roundabout,” seems simple enough. A roundabout is a devious device intended to control traffic. But you are wrong, the blue circle with the white arrows means, once again, “ignore this sign.” Greek traffic will not be controlled. It is too proud. Not by the Persians, not by the Turks, and certainly not by any silly EU Commission in Brussels that doesn’t even have war elephants or spears. Not that I blame them for this one. For one thing, I don’t take EU Commissions seriously either; for another, a brief examination of this so called roundabout will reveal two flaws. One, not only is it not round, but it’s actually a rectangle, the most geometrically inappropriate shape for this application. Two, since everyone treats the area around it as parking spaces, it is highly impractical to get near it, much less about it. So, as a “round-about”, it fails on both counts.

Exhibit B relates more to general road conditions. Crete has a central spine of mountains that makes the place even more beautiful. It also adds to the challenge of road navigation as, in addition to sporadic road maintenance (“it can wait“), the Mediterranean sun bleaching out any markings within a few weeks, and proud, proud drivers, you also get blind switchbacks terraced into the side of precipices, chunks of rubble larger than your vehicle, and ,of course, goats in the road. Look closely at exhibit B and you will note a typical blind switchback terraced into the side of a sheer cliff and a that the number of lanes is ambiguous at best and certainly not delineated. You will notice the terracing has been done without the benefit of shoring up the sides, hence the signs of impending collapse. Add all of this together and there‘s no need to ask why there‘s a guy standing near a gaping hole in the guardrail staring woefully down into the bottom of the gorge hundreds of meters below. The only thing missing is a herd of goats which I assume was there at the time the guardrail was breached and is probably the proximate cause. The only useful things I can say here are: approach corners with extreme caution. Honk your horn as you round them if it makes you feel better, but the car coming the other way won’t be able to hear you over the blaring Euro-beat music he’s proudly playing at max volume to cover the sound of his laboring engine which is proudly pegged to the redline lest he be going one km per hour slower than possible. Do not, I must repeat loudly, DO NOT drive these roads at night.

Exhibit C is just to drive home what I meant by “impending collapse” and “extreme caution.” You will round a corner at some point to be greeted by a pile of rubble. I love the fact that they actually bothered to put down a double solid line here given that it was reduced to one lane within a year of completion.

At this point I suppose you’re asking yourself, “why would anyone make this drive?” Exhibits D and E are a teaser for another entry intended to answer that question.

By the way, the only advice I’ve come across for getting a herd of goats out of the road: approach the goat with the biggest horns until you are face to face, look at him for a minute, suddenly turn and walk briskly in the direction you desire the goats to go. If he follows you, the rest will follow him. If he doesn’t, you’re out of luck until they decide to move on their own.

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Photos

Central and West Crete at a glance
Pictures from Heraklion, Chania, and Rethymnon

The Alleged Car
A tiny aluminum and plastic box manufactured by Fiat, here shown in the parking lot (an olive grove) at Knossos.

Exhibit A
A "roundabout." See if you can spot the geometric flaw.

Exhibit B
If there aren't enough reasons in this picture to convince you to be careful, I don't know what to tell you.

Exhibit C
Not to belabor the point, but be careful driving on Crete

Teaser 1
If you like rocky desolate nowhere, here it is.

Teaser 2
The landscape Southern Crete is known for its deep wind-carved gorges. Sumaria Gorge is the most famous but is sometimes closed due to excessive heat in August.