DOULIANA OR NTOULIANA |
Douliana, also known as Ntouliana, is a pretty little quaint village in the prefecture of Chania on the Greek Island of Crete. The variation in spelling is because the translation from the Greek language to the English language is not an exact science.
Many letters in the Greek alphabet do not translate exactly to a letter in the English alphabet.
So mapmakers, road sign writers, and guidebook authors translate the Greek alphabet place names to what they believe is a phonetic counterpart in the English language.
NTOULIANA VILLAGE |
So this is why you'll see Douliana sometimes spelt as Ntouliana on road signs and on maps. Douliana lies just 20km east of Chania and is close to the beach resorts of popular Almyrida and Kalyves.
The lovely village has a tiny church, traditional stone houses and dry stone walls encasing olive groves and carob trees. The whole area is very beautiful with tremendous views overlooking Souda Bay and the White Mountains.
A fine selection of luxury villas for rent lies at one end of the village of Ntouliana.
VILLAGE KAFENION |
For such a quiet, peaceful and tiny village there is a wide choice of places to eat and drink. A tiny rustic traditional Kafenion offers the thirsty traveller a variety of drinks including traditional Tsikoudia (Raki) and Ouzo. Each drink ordered is served along with a small meze of local foods such as Feta cheese and olives or sliced cucumber and tomatoes. There's also a little snack bar attached to the mini market.
IVGORITIS RESTAURANT |
The first restaurant you are likely to come across is the wonderful Ivgoritis with spectacular views over the hills and valleys of the Apokronos.Formerly a newly built traditionally styled Mezedhopolio (Mezedopwleio) - a place to buy traditional mezes or small plates of traditional food, this changed hands late in 2009. We haven't tried it yet, but understand the food and service are highly recommended.
Here's what Michele, who lives in Crete, has to say about the Ivgoritis Restaurant in Douliana:
"What a great little find this taverna is. Out on one of our regular jaunts around the area we were delighted to see that this small taverna was once again open.Now run by the previous owner of The Medusa Taverna at Kalives beach, Brigitte, we had the most exquisite meal that I have tasted for a very long time. I settled for the fillet steak which is real fillet and not the usual off the bone fillet. It was cooked to perfection and literally melted in my mouth. My husband tried the pork fillet in Metaxa sauce. Once again the meat was exactly what it should be, tender, moist and very tasty with the sauce. Both dishes were served with a choice of either chips or rosemary potatoes. We had the rosemary potatoes which was a real change from chips, chips and yet more chips served everywhere else.
The menu is small but will cater for all tastes. We did not choose starters as we were not too hungry but what I saw come out of the kitchen looked and smelled wonderful.
When the bill came it was accompanied by the usual raki but also some freshly made mini pancakes. Considering that we had two of the dearest choices on the menu we were more than pleasantly surprised with the total which was a little under €30 including a litre of house white wine.
The taverna itself is built in the traditional style of stone and is small and cosy with a great log fire in one corner. There are wonderful views over the valley at the back where in the summer we will definitely be sitting on the terrace enjoying our meals.
The service was excellent, all the food came out hot served by a very nice man who we learned was the owners son. This is a real family affair, with a lovely welcoming atmosphere.
We would thoroughly recommend a visit here as soon you can make to the area."
DOULIANA TAVERNA |
There's also a fabulous Taverna serving tasty dishes from the Cretan diet named the Douliana Taverna in the heart of the village. Click here to read our own Douliana Taverna Restaurant Review Alongside the Douliana Taverna there is a wonderful track used by walkers, hikers and cyclists that you can take down the hillside to the beaches of Kalyves and Almyrida.
Overlooked by the fabulous White Mountains (Lefka Ori), the scenery along the 3km track is simply stunning. For lovers of nature you'll find lots to interest you with rare wild flowers of Crete along the pathway and glorious birdlife in the sky.
We often have up to three or four buzzards circling above our heads as we wend our way down the scenic path from Douliana down to Kalyves along with many other birds.
We've seen many of the flowers featured in the excellent Wild Flowers of Crete book including rare endemic orchids.
To find out lots more about the wonderful wild flowers of Crete we can highly recommend the excellent, well written and informative hand book named Wild Flowers of Crete available from our Cretan Village Shop where you can buy a range of Crete books and maps of Crete. We stock a small handpicked collection of Crete books that are not available through Amazon and will be hard to find outside of Crete itself. They cover subjects such as Crete guide books and maps, the Samaria Gorge, Wild Flowers of Crete, Horta and the Cretan Diet cookery recipes.
We ship anywhere in the world, direct from our little Crete Village Shop!
