About Crete Winery
Crete Winery exists because Crete grows grapes you cannot taste anywhere else — Vidiano, Dafni, Liatiko, Kotsifali — and because the family wineries pouring them, in the villages around Peza, Dafnes, Archanes and Kolymvari, deserve better than a rushed stop on a coach itinerary.
We keep a short, current list of the wine tastings, winery tours and vineyard visits in Crete that you can actually book, from a 15 euro flight of five local wines to a long wine-and-olive-oil lunch, and we compare them plainly: what is poured, what it costs and who each one suits.
We are not sommeliers putting on a show. We are locals who spend a lot of afternoons in tasting rooms, and these guides read the way we would explain the options to a friend at the table — including which experience to skip.
How we choose
- We only list tastings and tours that are actually bookable, with live availability — no closed cellar doors, no enquire-and-wait.
- Prices are taken from the live listings and re-checked; when a winery changes its price, the guide changes with it.
- Every recommendation carries an honest note on who should skip it — a 160 euro feast is wasted on someone who only wanted a quick flight.
- We keep the list short. Seventeen well-chosen experiences beat a directory of every tasting room on the island.
- When one option is the only option — Rethymno currently has exactly one wine lunch — we say so instead of dressing it up as a top ten.
Who is behind this site
This guide is written by Antonis Kandilakis, based in Crete. Travelndo, where every experience here is booked, is our own booking platform, not a third-party affiliate scheme, and My Creta Villa, which appears in the villa sections, is our villa company. When you book through the links on this site, we earn from the booking — that is what funds the guides. We still tell you who should skip a trip, because these pages only work if you can trust them.
Which Cretan grape will you actually like?
Crete grows grapes you will not find anywhere else, and knowing three or four of them is most of the fun. Vidiano is the easy white to fall for, round and peachy, the one for Chardonnay and Viognier drinkers. Liatiko is a pale, gentle red that wins over people who think they do not like Greek reds, while the Kotsifali and Mandilari blend is the darker, spicier Heraklion classic. If you want the oddity, ask for Dafni, which smells of bay leaf, and in Chania you will meet Romeiko, an old oxidative style that is an acquired taste, so taste it before you commit to a bottle.
Almost all of it is made out in the villages. The biggest cluster sits just south of Heraklion, around Dafnes, Archanes and Peza, with several estates a short drive from Knossos, so a morning at the palace and an afternoon tasting is an easy day. Chania has its own scene around Kolymvari in the west, and over in Rethymno there is a single experience that pairs wine and olive oil with a proper lunch.
We do not own a winery. This is an independent guide to the tastings and winery tours already running across Crete, with real prices, the actual villages, and honest notes on which grape and which experience suits you. Read the guides below, compare the live options, and book the one that fits directly through our partner.