We just got back from our vacation in Falasarna and stayed at Hotel Plakures at the recommendation of a friend who had heard it was a great hotel. Indeed, the grounds were well kept, the rooms clean and the view great, BUT, the hotel wants to attract and cater ONLY to German tourists. They do not offer a warm welcome to Greek tourists, the staff does not even speak Greek...I had to order my coffee, dinner, etc in English in my own country! We had the feeling that we were not very welcome and that they were glad to see us go (keep in mind we had no problems and very minimal communications with the owners/staff while we stayed there).

Would not recommend it for Greek Tourists.

A great place, nice arcitecture, very lonesome place, good food - but the landlord- family was not able to switch from managing a primitive tavern to al real hotel. The greek boss likes loud music at night; the german wife seems to become very fast aggressive. You have to live together with the families greek boys in the restaurant and at the pool.

We stayed at the hotel Plakures for 3 nights in late September 2005. We were initially quite impressed by the overall look of the hotel, especially the well maintained grounds and pool. Our room which was in a building away from the main hotel was well appointed, spacious and clean. It overlooked the pool and had a good view.

However, the hotel lacked atmosphere. We spent one evening in the hotel bar / television area of the hotel and noticed a distinctly bad odor. We didn't return and spent the other nights at different restaurants and taverna's in Falasarna. The hotel proprietors (Greek/German) cater especially for German holiday-makers.

On our first morning, there was no hot water to take a shower. We called reception and spoke to the co-owner, a small German Lady, who said that she would send someone to fix it, but we would have to wait for the water to heat up. Some 45 minutes later, the water was still not hot.

The following morning, once again, there was no hot water. We called again and complained that the problem had not yet been fixed. Again, we were told that we would have to wait for hot water and that they were trying to fix the problem. We were told that if we didn't want to wait for them to fix the hot water, we could find another hotel (which we would have done if we were not flying out of Crete the following day).

The morning of day 3, there was still no hot water – (so much for German efficiency !). We didn't bother calling again this time, as we simply wanted to leave the Hotel Plakures. As we checked out, there was no apology about the lack of hot water each morning for the duration of our stay and no token reduction in our room rate for the inconvenience caused.

Falasarna is a quiet but lovely location with olives groves set back behind a beautiful beach and the local taverna's serving up delicious food. There are many other places offering accommodation in Falasarna run by the locals, probably offering a much warmer reception than that offered by Hotel Plakures, this being the reason why we will not be returning to the Hotel Plakures again.