The Zakros Gorge is a small gorge in East Crete, which starts a little after the village of Ano Zakros (Upper Zakros) and ends at the village and beach of Kato Zakros (Lower Zakros).

Zakros Gorge is both beautiful and accessible, although its other name, the “Gorge of the Dead” may seem rather worrying at first if you don’t know its history.

It wasn’t called that because hikers leave their bones there, but because the ancient Minoans used the caves in its steep cliffs to bury their dead. It must have been a great honour for the dead, for people to risk their lives getting them up the sheer walls of the gorge to lay them in their final resting place, a cave in this imposing gorge.