Situated in the hills above Elounda, this Villa is superb. Facilities and hospitality second to none. Extremely secure great location between Elounda and Agios Nikolaos. The hosts prepared lovely Cretan food for us. The holiday was wonderful and the villa helped make it so.

We loved the villa! We were a group of 7, including 3 young children. The villa suited us perfectly. The pool is gorgeous and the views and surroundings stunning. The hosts were lovely and extremely hospitable. We arrived after midnight and were greeted with a delicious home cooked meal. I would definitely recommend this villa and hope to stay there again!

Une magnifique villa avec une vue mer imprenable conjuguée à un accueil chaleureux et un service de qualité. Nous avons passé en famille une superbe semaine. Nos hôtes ont été très attentionnés, nous indiquant les bons restaurants et spots a visiter. Si vous venez dans cette belle région crétoise, n'hésitez pas c'est ici qu'il faut venir.

Had a lovely stay in the Villa Avra. A warm welcome on arrival together with a superb home cooked meal which was superb. The villa was well maintained and we were looked after by the friendly maids and maintenance man who kept the place spotless, always with a friendly hello. The family would call around from time to time to make sure all was well and bringing very tasty local treats. we used to walk down most nights to the centre taking the first turning to the right then walking along the sea front with a great choice of restaurants then a taxi back from the square costs 7 euros. Easy and very relaxing holiday. Had a couple of BBQs too, with meat from the local butcher who will cut the meat as you like it .Would thoroughly recommend the car hire through the owners company. Good quality of cars plus one of the easiest pick up and drop off we have ever had plus very competitive prices too. Lovely location, friendly people, very relaxing holiday.

Just returned from holiday with family - 82 year old, 49, 48, 47 , 13, 11 ,6 & 3 year old. Stayed at Villa Avra. This is the largest of the 3 Anemos villas. It has a self contained flat on the ground floor (double bedroom, 2 singles, bathroom, kitchenette and living area). The first floor up has a large dining room, bathroom, bedroom with 2 single beds and access to the pool and garden area. From this first floor area you go up an internal set of stairs to the master bedroom (queen sized bed), shower room and access to a sun deck. Villa Avra is at the back of the other 2 villas. The other 2 villas have better views over the lovely bay of Elounda but do not have the same amount of ground as the Avra. The villa was beautiful and immaculately kept. There was a large garden area with herbs, trees and plants. There was a lovely area to have your BBQ. Housekeeping came in every day (apart from Sunday) and thoroughly tidied the house. I think the gardener was also in every day cleaning the garden area and pool. The pool was very clean (but a bit cold particularly in first week for some reason). The air conditioning worked very well. The villa is a little difficult to find - even after 2 weeks we still kept having a little difficulty in determining the exact turn off. Elounda main area is probably about 1 mile away but I would not recommend walking there as the road has no pavements and the driving is quite erratic - locals use the road almost like a dual carriageway when it isn't so cars can be quite close to the edge. I would have loved to have gone for a walk in the evening from the villa but it just wasn't possible because of the busy main road. Unless you intend staying at the villa for the duration of your holiday (and getting food supplies delivered to your door - which is possible from a local supermarket) a car is a must. We hired 2 cars from Clubcar rentals who unfortunately I would not recommend. We had booked 2 new VW Golfs or similar - unfortunately similar was a Toyato Yaris and a small Peugeot - which had 130,000 miles on clock and a lot of damage. This car struggled getting us from the airport to the villa. However Joanna (our host and owners daughter) arranged for this to be exchanged the following day for a VW Polo. The 2 smaller cars were not suitable for carrying all of our luggage to the airport and again the owners managed to arrange for the Toyota to be replaced by a people carrier on our last day -which was a godsend. I have to say that Joanna (and her mother) were very attentive hosts. There was a lovely dinner waiting for us when we arrived and we regularly received bakery gifts in the villa after our outings around and a about Crete. As mentioned above they also managed to sort out the issue regarding the car hire. Joanna also recommended restaurants for us to go to. Elounda was bigger than I had expected. The beaches at Elounda are not great (quite a lot of shingle/stones). Joanna did point out a beach - Almyros - about a 10 minute drive away which was much better ( very sandy , very little stones and shallow for a long distance). There were lovely tavernas in Elounda - which I will review separately. We did a lot of travelling in our 2 weeks - over 1000 km. Highlights 1. Zeus cave and Lasithi Plateau - that was stunning and we all talked about it. Something for everyone - kids got to go into the cave and a journey on a donkey and granda stayed at a taverna as we did so looking out over the plateau 2. Knossos - 3rd visit to Knossos but 1st for the children which they thought was amazing - its very hot there - if you are going either be there first thing when it opens or at the end of the day. We paid for a guide 80 euros for our party but you do get so much more information. 3. Spinalonga - we took the boat trip from Plaka (the shortest route and the one that would have been used by the lepers). With hindsight I think we would have been better to take one of the trips from Agios Nikolaus which included a BBQ and visit to a secluded beach. 4. Submarine boat in Ag Nik. Kids loved this - we saw so much fish and turtles. The kids in fact did this twice and would have done it again. Only disappointment is that it is for 1hr 30 and for the last 30 mins you have to go above board - don't know why. 5. Almond festival in Kroustas (only happens once a year and Joanna let us know about it). Think we were the only tourists there so very authentic 6. Trip up to Krista and ancient ruins of Lato. Krista is beautiful - an authentic greek village. We thought the prices there were much better and most items being sold were made there or thereabouts. 7. Trip to Heraklion museum. Although very interesting the kids found it boring 8. The Creta aquarium. Small aquarium but nice and cool and good entertainment for an hour or so on the way back from Heraklion. We went to a lovely beach just down from the aquarium and the sea water was so warm. 9. Acquaplus water park. Took the 2 older children - there wouldn't have been many rides the younger 2 could have got on and that would have caused problems. Good way to spend 3 hours or so - queues were small 10. Labyrinth - 13 year old spotted this on way to Acqua plus (about a mile away). It was deadly quiet - probably only another 10 people there - not sure why - can only assume location as you would definitely need a car. We all did the labyrinth (which was good fun) and also the crazy golf. We went around the little farm and garden they had. The kids then went and did the laser game within the huge Trojan horse. 11. The market in Ag Nik (Wednesday mornings) - where bargains are to be had and where the fruit and veg are a fraction of the price compared to the supermarkets. 12. Boat trip from further along the coast (about 40 mins away) to island of Psiri. This was quite pleasant and the kids were allowed a small time to do fishing off the boat (nothing caught unfortunately). 13. Visit to Ierapetera - went there when it was cloudy in Elounda but turned out to be very sunny in Ierapetera. Boats seemed to be leaving every 20 minutes to Chrissi Island. We didn't do this as we only got there at 1pm. Greece/Crete is definitely more expensive than it used be to go because of exchange rate. I would say that all foods were more expensive than in UK - especially fruit and veg (8 euros for a punnet of strawberries or 1euro 50 for a small cucumber). When we sat down for drinks it would regularly be around 40 - 50 euros for the 8 of us - mainly soft drinks/milkshakes/fruit juice and a couple of small beers). We made 2 large trips to Lidl in Ag Nic to get most of our food it - it had a much bigger selection that the local shops and was less expensive.