If you follow me on Instagram you probably already know this, but on the this August The Boyfriend and I packed our bags and traveled to Crete! Even though we just celebrated our 13 year anniversary this was our very first beach holiday together, so we decided to go all out and booked ourselves into the 5 star spa resort Minoa Palace in a town called Platanias.

The hotel was terrific – beautiful, friendly, welcoming and with plenty of places to kick back and relax even for the non-beach/pool bunnies. The Boyfriend has a black belt in TripAdvisor so I let him pick the place, and as usual he did not disappoint. Platanias is a very small town about a 30 minute drive west from Chania (Crete’s 2nd largest city) and I have vacationed there two times previously, but none of the times have I lived in a hotel as nice as this one.

This is where I liked to sit and read, and I really got a lot of reading done. I don’t have the patience (or the skin type) to lay on the beach for hours on end, so it was lovely to find a shady spot and curl up with a good book. It didn’t hurt that there was a bar nearby, either. They made a mean mojito.

I couldn’t go on holiday without doing some shopping, and since Chania had a Sephora I naturally had to get some makeup. I have been looking for the L’Oréal Lumi range for months, but had to face the fact that they pulled the range from Norwegian stores shortly after the launch and before I even got the chance to try it. I might have done a happy dance when I found it in Greece. Maybe. Same goes for their celebrity-named lipsticks, which I have only previously seen in their Flagship store in Oslo. I swear, it’s like they don’t actually want me to buy their products, because the ones that I want are practically impossible to find in stores.

I also did a little Pharmacy haul, since both the selection and the prices were much better than what I can find at home. I’m a huge fan of Bioderma so I made sure to get a giant bottle, and I also went a bit lip balm crazy. I had heard so many good things about Nuxe’s Reve de Miel, and my goodness did it live up to the hype! I bought one jar to keep in my bag and another jar to keep on my bedside table, because I am never going without that stuff again.

I also bought a few bags. You know me, I’m a sucker for a good bag, and Greece is a great place for leather. I snagged this boston bag in a perfect overnight size for €100, which should translate to about £80 or $130. I believe the SA told me it is bullhide. VERY sturdy, very roomy, and very classic.

This bag I bought from a local leather craftsman in Platanias. I had purchased two bags from this little family shop (simply named Leather Centre) on a previous visit four years ago, and happened to be wearing one of his bags on the day that I stopped by to browse. He immediately noticed and got excited right away – before I knew it he had started doing thread maintenance on my bag and offered me a hefty discount on any new bag that I wanted. I couldn’t resist an offer like that, so I ended up buying the same bag as the one that I was wearing, but this time in a beautiful bottle green. Great bag and a great story, and the man proceeded to wave and say hello every time he saw me about town for the next two weeks.

We also made several trips to Chania, as busses passed by our hotel pretty much every 15-20 minutes. It was very nice to be able to leave the small town behind for a little while and alternate between browsing stores and enjoying the historic Venetian harbor. You could find anything from Starbucks and Zara to high end and the traditional and hand made – and makeup. Don’t forget the makeup.

Trust me to find a poodle even in Greece. This one watched over a jewelry store.

I’m not used to eating out every day, and I also hate having to look for food when I’m hungry, so we quickly found our favorite places and kept coming back. I know the foodies among you will hiss at me for this, but I’m really not that fussed about trying new places to eat – I find something I like and stick with it until The Boyfriend forces me to go somewhere else. We went to Kyano for lunch nearly every day and loved Barba Thomas for dinner. They were highly recommended on TripAdvisor, which means they also had the Boyfriend stamp of approval, and both the staff and the food was phenomenal.

You might snicker at the “lamp chops”, but let me tell you, that lamp chop was delicious.

And that was it! I’m going to upload a lot more photos to my Flickr account later this week, so stop by there if you want to see more of my trip. We had a phenomenal time, and we are so relaxed and ready to face autumn. The trip home had some mandatory Greek delays so we didn’t arrive at our apartment until 5.30 am Sunday morning, but I am now back and trying to get used to Norwegian temperatures and actual clothing again. Tomorrow I’m going for a short trip to Molde to get The Poodle back from her summer camp at my parents’s place, and later this week it is back to work. I hope your summer was as lovely as mine, and that everyone is ready for layers, boots and pumpkin spice lattes. I know I am!