From Chania: Olive Oil, Wine, Cheese & Honey Tasting Tour

About This Experience

This is the broadest of the Chania food-and-oil day tours, and the one most people book first — it carries more reviews than any other olive oil tour on the island bar one. Seven hours, five producers, and about three of those hours spent on the road, because the stops are scattered across the Chania hinterland rather than clustered in one village.

The anchor is the Olive Tree of Vouves. Estimated at somewhere between 3,000 and 5,000 years old, it is a sculptural, hollowed trunk that still fruits, and it is the reason the village of Ano Vouves has a museum rather than just a tree. You get half an hour there before the tasting block begins.

From there the day runs through a family bakery for rusks and savoury pastries, a multi-award-winning cheese factory, a grove where the honey process is walked through from hive to bottle, and an olive mill where the oil is followed from harvest to finished bottle. The last stop is Pnevmatikakis Winery at Nopigia, where twenty local wines are poured over about an hour.

Two honest caveats. At 4.6 out of 5 across more than a thousand reviews this rates slightly below the island's smaller, more specialised oil tours — it is a full coach day with a lot of driving, and the pace suits that. And whether you see the cheese room or the press actually working depends on when you come; outside harvest the guide explains rather than demonstrates.

Highlights

• Stand under the Olive Tree of Vouves, estimated at 3,000 to 5,000 years old
• Tour a Cretan olive mill and follow the oil from harvest through pressing to bottling
• Taste at a multi-award-winning cheese factory, with each stage of the process explained
• Follow honey from the hive to the bottle on a working grove
• Sample 20 local wines at the family-run Pnevmatikakis Winery at Nopigia
• Eat your way through a family bakery's rusks, breads and savoury pastries

What's Included

• ✓ Hotel pick-up and drop-off from Chania and the surrounding coastal resorts
• ✓ Air-conditioned coach, with roughly 1.5 hours on the road in each direction
• ✓ Professional local guide for the full seven hours
• ✓ Guided visit to an olive mill, covering harvesting, pressing and finishing
• ✓ Tasting at a family-run bakery — Cretan rusks, fresh bread and savoury pastries
• ✓ Cheese tasting at a multi-award-winning factory
• ✓ Honey-making demonstration and a walk through the olive grove
• ✓ Winery tour and 20 wine samples at Pnevmatikakis
• ✓ All tasting fees for the food and drink listed above

Not Included

• Any food or drink beyond the listed tastings
• Products you choose to buy from the producers
• Gratuities for your guide and driver

What to Bring

• Comfortable walking shoes
• Sun hat
• Sunglasses
• Sunscreen
• Cash for producer purchases

Good to Know & Caveats

• Your exact pickup time is issued through GetYourGuide — check your booking 24 hours before, and be at the pickup point five minutes early.
• Wear comfortable walking shoes: the grove and farm stops are on uneven ground.
• Bring a hat, sunglasses and high-SPF sunscreen — most of the day is outdoors.
• Some of the smaller producers take cash only for purchases.
• Anything you buy can be stored safely on the coach for the rest of the day.
• Whether you see cheese actually being made depends on the season; otherwise the guide talks the process through.

Meeting Point

Hotel pick-up from Chania town and the surrounding coastal resorts — 104 pickup points, from Kolymvari and Platanias through Agia Marina and Stalos. Your exact time is confirmed through GetYourGuide the day before.