people walking in the Samaria Gorge, Crete, Greece
The Samariá Gorge is a national park in the island of Crete, one of the major tourist attractions of the island. The gorge is in the prefecture of Chania in the South West of Crete. It was created by a small river running between the White Mountains (Lefká Óri) and Mount Volakias. There are a number of other gorges in the White Mountains. Some people say that the gorge is 18 km long but this distance refers to the distance between the settlement of Omalos on the northern side of the plateau and the village of Agia Roumeli. In fact, the gorge is 16km long, starting at an altitude of 1250m, at the northern entrance, and taking you all the way down to the shores of the Libyan sea in Agia Roumeli. The walk through the National Park of Samaria is 13 km but you will have to walk the extra 3 km to Agia Roumeli from the exit of the National Park making it 16 km. The most famous part of the gorge is the section known as the 'Iron Gates', where the sides of the gorge close to about 4 meters in and reach up to 500 meters high.
Size: 3516px × 5384px
Location: Samaria Gorge, Crete, Greece
Photo credit: © Malcolm Wray / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: agia, blue, chania, crete, flower, fun, gates, goat, gorge, greece, holiday, hot, iron, joy, mount, mountain, mountains, omalos, prefecture, rock, roumeli, samaria, season, sky, south, tour, tourism, tree, vacation, view, village, visit, volakia, walk, warm, water, west, white
