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One excursion everyone takes from Ayios Nikolaos is to KRITSA , a "traditional" village about 10km inland. Buses run at least every hour from the bus station, and despite the commercialization it's still a good trip: the local crafts (weaving, ceramics and embroidery basically, though they sell almost everything here) are fair value, and it's also a welcome break from living in the fast lane at "Ag Nik". In fact, if you're looking for somewhere to stay around here, Kritsa has a number of advantages: chiefly availability of rooms , better prices and something at least approaching a genuinely Cretan atmosphere; try Argyro (tel 08410/51 174; up to ?24), with pleasant rooms around a courtyard on your way in to the village. The small platia at the centre of the village is the focus of life and there are a number of decent places to eat here, too: Taverna-Snack Bar Tzortzis , just uphill from the platia and bus stop, is a good bet, or Sygonos , near the bus stop, for a meal or coffee and cake under one of the plane trees. On the approach road, some 2km before Kritsa, is the lovely Byzantine church of Panayia Kyra (April-Oct daily 8.30am-2.30pm; ?2.40), inside which survives perhaps the most complete set of Byzantine frescoes in Crete. The fourteenth and fifteenth-century works have been much retouched, but they're still worth the visit. Excellent (and expensive) reproductions are sold from a shop alongside. Just beyond the church, a surfaced road leads off for 3km to the archeological site of Lato (Tues-Sun 9am-3pm; closed first Sun of the month; free), where the substantial remains of a Doric city are coupled with a grand hilltop setting. The city itself is extensive, but largely neglected, presumably because visitors and archeologists on Crete are more concerned with the Minoan era. Ruins aside, you could come here just for the views: west over Ayios Nikolaos and beyond to the bay and Olous (which was Lato's port), and inland to the Lasithi mountains.
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