More of this Feature • Part 1: Quick Look at the Tour • Part 2: The Destinations - Coastal Villages of Crete • Part 3: The Sightseeing - Beaches, Fortresses, and Minoan Palaces • Part 4: Crete Photo Gallery • Part 5: My Sea Kayaking Journal

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Day Eight: We're up early for the eight-mile open-ocean crossing; with good weather and conditions, it will take about three hours; if it's too rough, we won't even launch. But the day is beautiful and the water is glossy and calm, and once offshore, the fabled light of Greece is beaming down on us as if Apollo himself is blessing our crossing.

There's an excited cry up ahead as sea turtles are spotted. Unfortunately, excited cries are also an excellent way to keep sea turtles away, but it's still a magical moment. We keep an eye out for dolphins and sea lions, who are often sighted here, but the turtles are our only companions this morning aside from a couple of small fishing boats. There's also a few more excited cries as we discover the joys of playing a game of open-ocean wet sponge throwing at adjacent kayakers - that I should be happily and fearlessly playing anything in the middle of the ocean, and having this much fun while doing it, is as amazing to me as anything else on this trip.

Midway, I call an impromptu party and we all raft together and pass around my final imported emergency rations of Peanut M&Ms.

The crossing, the final kayaking of the trip, is over too soon. It's hard to go in. I look back at the distant coastline where the white buildings of Agia Galini are barely visible. Eight miles across open ocean by kayak still seems an impossibility, particularly for me; pairing that thought with the fact that I covered over a hundred miles of Cretan seacoast during the course of this trip seems equally impossible.

Due to flight constraints I'm staying on a few extra days, and the next day I join the sunset hike with the new group. I'm reluctant since I remember it took three people to get me up the cliffs last time, but Rick persuades me that I should give it a try and come along. Armed with just my walking stick, I attack the hillside. Because I'm moving much more quickly than before, the pace is hard, but the same rocks that gave me such problems a week ago seem much easier and I scramble over them without problems. This time I make it to the top of the bluffs without any assistance at all. At the top, Rick says a simple "Well done."

The Aftermath:
I'm back home on dry land now, tempted by the thought of repeating this same trip in September. Realistically, the joyful task of exploring other Greek destinations has a much better claim on my time than to repeat these so soon. Or so I keep telling myself. The truth is, I understand perfectly why Rick has been haunting the southwestern Cretan coast for twenty-five years. Once experienced, it's hard to resist, and my other favorite spots in Greece have all slipped down a notch to make room for this stretch of coast. That's not the only change. Once happy to be sedentary, now my body is chafing at inactivity, and when another journey to Brazil on the heels of this Cretan one is a more "normal" trip of hotels and cars and convention rooms, I grow antsy and wish I were back on the water. Looking out across a lagoon in Rio de Janeiro, small low boats in the distance lift my heart for an instant and I'm wondering if there's a kayaking opportunity available before I realize they're some other sort of racing rowboat instead.

Finally returning home, I think back on one of our last nights in Matala. Abram, the owner of the Zafiria tavern, set down a half-full pitcher of raki he had just used to fill our farewell glasses. Laughing, he admonished us to "Keep the change".

So far, I am.

The Northwest Passage offers cycling, hiking, and kayaking adventures on Crete, Corfu, and Lesbos as well as other destinations throughout the world.

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