From Heraklion: Private Knossos Day Tour｜Greece

Visit and explore the main sights and landmarks of Heraklion in the comfort and convenience of a private car. Combine the typical historical sites with some hidden gems the city has to offer. Customize your itinerary and choose how long you wish to spend in each location as well as make extra stops if you like.

Start with a pickup from your hotel and head to the Knossos archeological site, just 5 km southeast of Heraklion. The first excavation was conducted in 1878 by Minos Kalokairinos. The site expands about 22,000 sq.m. Human inhabitation of it stretches from 6,800 – 1300 BC.

It is the biggest Minoan Palace of Crete which architectural features were copied later. The building is built around the big rectangular central yard and extends towards each direction, multi-floored and quite complicated at places. Within its premises, multi-use rooms and buildings were discovered such as: a great number of storage rooms and hundreds of ‘pithoi’, or jars, pottery workshops, stone carvers' workshops, metal makers areas, shrines and temples, ‘lustral basin’, or purification rooms, throne room with a gypsum throne, staircases and living quarters.

The palace was destroyed twice and it was partly after the final catastrophe. It is very likely that during its first phase it was not a complete building, but a collection of ‘insule’, a number of different non-united blocks.

Next, visit the Heraklion Archaeological Museum, one of the most important and significant museums in Greece. The museum was built between 1937-1940 and boasts 20 rooms with exhibits originating exclusively from Crete. The collections come mostly from central and eastern Crete and cover a span of 5,500 years. The exhibits are presented following the chronological evolution of the Minoan civilization.

Finally, visit the Koules Venetian Fortress that dominates the entrance to the Venetian Harbour of Heraklion. The Venetians called it "Sea Fortress" (Castello a Mare or Rocca a Mare), but today it is Known by its Turkish name, Koules, a corruption of Su Kulesi (Water Tower). It is one of the most familiar and beloved monuments of the city, and the symbol of Heraklion.