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Places near Λάκκοι
Hiking and nature close to Zourva village: From Lakki Village - Vrisi gorge and Vrissi water source - Zourva village.
We started from Lakki, a village on the way to Omalos plateau, 460m asl.
The path is marvelous and we enjoyed every step. Our direction was eastward. We were walking discovering gradually all the surprises of this gorge.At the end of the gorge there is a cave with an underground river, from which the gorge took its name (Vrissi=Fount).
Facing the gorge from above we stayed surprised: rugged yet beautiful places, cypresses, oaks and their amazing flowers dominating the view. Unfortunately in the midst of this beauty the signs of the destructive presence of man with the recent fires is obvious.
We are on the way to the cave - fountain and now the path began to be uphill. This old trail becomes more and more difficult.It has been already 3 hours and we approach our destination, the fountain which supplies water the villages Zourva and Lakki, an impressive mountain location with an altidude of 790m.
The village Askordalos or Skordalou, lies at a distance of 20 km away from the city of Hania at the feet of the White Mountains and 10 km far from Lakkoi village. It is one of the greenest villages in Crete with the oldest olive orchards in Crete and in Europe and the main income of its people comes from olive oil (tsounati variety).
By the end of October 2004, a sudden hot wind storm from Africa caused an electricity pole wire to break. This started a wild fire, which very quickly spread around so much that no one could control it. Twenty-four hours later, the whole region around the village had burnt almost to the ground.
The damage was unprecedented: sixty thousand olive trees over 400 hundred years old had been burnt. The village had been ruined both financially and ecologically.
Built among large orange groves, Meskla looks so serene and pretty that it is hard to think it was twice destroyed in the past. But it was. The Venetians, first, and the Turks later, laid everything waste, and it is indeed very fortunate that two Byzantine churches managed to survive, even though they were seriously damaged.
It can be reached by taking the exit to the left in the village of Fournes. The road on the right heads for the villages of Lakki and Omalos. A narrow road with many curves that leads through forest, orange groves and olive groves will take you to Meskla in about 20 to 30 minutes. Meskla is the site of an ancient city, and various artefacts and remains of cyclopean walls have been found here.
The church of Christ the Saviour has some wonderful wall paintings by the hand of the Veneri brothers (1403), but unfortunately they suffered severe and irreparable damage. The church of the Virgin Mary, a little further to the north, is particularly interesting, as it contains parts of earlier buildings including a temple of Aphrodite that was once built in this exact place.
It is also worth noting that the mosaic covering part of the present church floor was once the mosaic floor of a fifth century basilica. Finally, around the village one can see many ancient ruins of homes as well as parts of a city wall. Although it is not certain which city that wall surrounded, the ruins are thought to belong to the ancient town of Rizinia.
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