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Notícia, histórias, Conselho, e dicas para quem passa um tempo na bela Creta

0Dirigindo & aluguel de veículos em Creta

Para ver grande parte de Creta, você provavelmente precisará de um carro ou outro veículo para se locomover. Há ônibus e táxis em Creta, mas um veículo particular será mais rápido, mais confortável, e mais rentável do que os táxis. Também é possível levar seu próprio carro, ou contratar outros veículos.

Aluguel de carros

The­re are a huge num­ber of car ren­tal agen­ci­es on Cre­te, from small local busi­nes­ses to the big mul­ti­na­ti­o­nal brands. Car hire costs vary sig­ni­fi­can­tly with a small car out of peak sea­son avai­la­ble from £50 a week, to fan­ci­er vehi­cles in peak sea­son cos­ting seve­ral hun­dred pounds a week. Gene­rally you will want to spend as lit­tle time in the car as pos­si­ble so we recom­mend get­ting the most cost effec­ti­ve opti­on available.

The Gre­eks dri­ve in the right like the rest of Euro­pe so if you are a UK dri­ver used to dri­ving on the left this will take a lit­tle get­ting used to. If you are inex­pe­ri­en­ced at dri­ving on the other side of the road I recom­mend having another qua­li­fi­ed dri­ver in the pas­sen­ger seat and asking them to try to be alert and to alert you if they think you’­re get­ting it wrong.

The majo­rity of hire vehi­cles are petrol rather than die­sel, and are manu­al rather than auto­ma­tic. Até a presente data, hybrid and elec­tric vehi­cles are very rare on Cre­te. Se você precisa de um 6 ou 7 sea­ter you may find it che­a­per to hire 2 carros pequenos (assu­ming you have 2 peo­ple wil­ling to dri­ve) so it is always worth com­pa­ring the cost of the­se 2 opções.

The vast majo­rity of roads on Cre­te are now pro­perly paved so you are unli­kely to need an off-road capa­ble vehi­cle unless you really want to explo­re off the bea­ten track. The most use­ful fea­tu­re of an off-road capa­ble vehi­cle in Cre­te is the higher ground cle­a­ran­ce, rather than having all-whe­el-dri­ve so if you wish to hire an SUV I recom­mend avoi­ding 4WD vehi­cles that are really aimed at road users — ins­te­ad get something like a Suzu­ki Jimny whi­ch is more basic in the inte­ri­or but offers a good ground clearance.

To find car hire I recom­mend using the links on Money­Sa­vin­gEx­pert to the com­pa­ri­son sites. Look out for agents whi­ch do not have col­lec­ti­on points at your point of arri­val (e.g. Hera­kli­on Air­port) as a shut­tle bus to the car is pro­ba­bly the last thing you will want to have to do after you arri­ve. Also be awa­re that most deals do not inclu­de addi­ti­o­nal dri­vers, assentos de carro, caixas de telhado, etc and that the­se will cost extra. Also note that whilst all deals inclu­de insu­ran­ce, most of them have a very high excess that you would have to pay in the event of any dama­ge to a vehi­cle. I always take a seri­es of pho­tos of the vehi­cle befo­re set­ting off in it, and then again when retur­ning the vehi­cle so the agents know you will chal­len­ge any fal­se claims. I have never had to dis­pu­te any claims in Cre­te, although I have elsewhe­re in Euro­pe. Eu vejo isso como um 5 minu­te job that pro­vi­de much pea­ce of mind.

It is also pos­si­ble to take our “excess cover” whi­ch means you don’t pay any excess. This is usu­ally a very expen­si­ve extra so I don’t recom­mend get­ting it as part of your ren­tal deal — ins­te­ad you can get “excess insu­ran­ce” from an inde­pen­dent pro­vi­der. In the event of dama­ge you would pay the excess to the car hire com­pany and then reclaim the cost of the excess from the insu­rer back home. The cost of the­se poli­ci­es is usu­ally around £20-£30 and they pro­vi­de pea­ce of mind so they are worth con­si­de­ring. Money­Sa­vin­gEx­pert has a sec­ti­on with infor­ma­ti­on on this that I recommend.

Pegar seu próprio carro na balsa

The­re is a regu­lar car fer­ry ser­vi­ce to Cre­te from Pira­eus (Athens har­bour) so you can take your own car to Cre­te. Se você mora no Reino Unido, tenha em mente que é quase 5,000 mile round trip but on the upsi­de you do get to see some gre­at parts of Euro­pe on the way. I have done the dri­ve twi­ce, dri­ving out­bound by going east and then south (through Ger­many, Cze­ch Repu­blic, Hun­gary, Ser­bia and Gre­e­ce and a few other coun­tri­es too) and retur­ning along the Adri­a­tic and across the Alps (e.g. via Alba­nia, Cro­a­tia, Itália, and Ger­many amongst others). Sha­red 3 or 4‑ways the costs of doing so are very simi­lar to the cost of flying and and hiring a car in peak season.

The night­fer­ry from Athens to Cre­te (Pira­eus to Hera­kli­on) is very rea­so­na­ble and typi­cally costs around E400-500 for 1 car and an insi­de 4‑bed bunk. The­re is rea­so­na­bly pri­ced food and drink ser­ved onbo­ard, the beds are rea­so­na­bly com­for­ta­ble, and a cabin inclu­des a shower. The­re is also a day­ti­me sai­ling whi­ch is che­a­pe­ar but you will then use up a day of holi­day on the fer­ry and will need an extra night of accom­mo­da­ti­on on land whi­ch pro­ba­bly makes the ove­rall cost very simi­lar so I recom­mend the night fer­ry if you can fit the timings. It is gre­at arri­ving in Cre­te in the mor­ning fresh and ready for a full day.

Convenções

Cre­te, like any other coun­try, has dif­fe­rent con­ven­ti­ons to your home coun­try when it comes to road use. The Cre­tans are gene­rally very cour­te­ous dri­vers, cer­tainly much more so than typi­cal UK dri­vers, but if you don’t unders­tand the con­ven­ti­ons you may mis­ta­kenly think otherwi­se. Here is a quick sum­mary of some of the nota­ble differences.

  • Se você for o carro da frente em um semáforo vermelho, the car behind will likely beep you to let you know when the light turns gre­en — they’­re being help­ful not rude
  • Cre­tans love to beep to say hel­lo to peo­ple, and to cele­bra­te (e.g. a wed­ding pro­ces­si­on), bee­ping is very rarely used for a nega­ti­ve reason
  • Roun­da­bouts (traf­fic cir­cles) are pretty rare and all the dif­fe­rent visi­tors on the island apply their own rules to them. The Cre­tans seem to adap­ted to this mayhem by adop­ting a first come first ser­ved appro­a­ch. Appro­a­ch with care.
  • Cars have right of way at pedes­tri­an cros­sings, a menos que uma luz âmbar esteja piscando.
  • A rai­sed open palm (usu­ally used as a thank you in the UK) might be con­si­de­red rude, não se preocupe com isso

Com­ple­te-Cre­te tem um bom (and lon­ger) arti­cle about the­se dif­fe­ren­ces and some of the rea­sons for them.

Estacionamento

Road-side par­king is wides­pre­ad in Cre­te, gene­rally you can do as the locals do — i.e. park whe­re-ever you see other peo­ple par­king. The­re are some sec­ti­ons of cle­arway whe­re you shouldn’t park whi­ch are cle­arly sig­ned. The other key thing to be awa­re of is that in some pla­ces a sys­tem ope­ra­tes whe­re you park on 1 lado da estrada apenas, and the cor­rect side chan­ges from month to month — one side of the road for even num­ber months, and the other side for odd num­ber months. This will be indi­ca­ted with a I and an II with the stan­dard red cir­cle and dia­go­nal showing whi­ch months are prohi­bi­ted for that side.

Motos & Moto-quatro

It is pos­si­ble to hire motor­bi­kes and quad­bi­kes on Cre­te. My advi­ce is don’t. For short dis­tan­ces you would be bet­ter wal­king, and for lon­ger trips a car is vas­tly safer. Cre­te doesn’t have the best record for road safety, and whilst things have sig­ni­fi­can­tly impro­ved over the last deca­de a num­ber of peo­ple are kil­led every year on quad­bi­kes and motor­bi­kes (e.g. 2018). ABTA has repe­a­te­dly (e.g. aqui e aqui) advi­sed against quad­bi­ke and moped hire. By law you are requi­red to wear a full set of safety gear but many peo­ple don’t becau­se wea­ring a full set of leathers in 35C heat isn’t very nice. You also need to have a valid dri­ving licen­se to hire any moto­ri­sed vehi­cle but I am awa­re of many cases whe­re the­se rules have been igno­red in the past by some ren­tal agents. I have also heard many tales of scams invol­ving quad­bi­ke hired to youn­ger peo­ple in the more “party ori­en­ta­ted” parts of the island (e.g. Malia) whe­re the vehi­cle is late rmys­te­ri­ously lost, sto­len, or dama­ged, and the agency then demands lar­ge sums of money becau­se the ren­ter didn’t make sure they had pro­per paperwork and insu­ran­ce for the ren­tal. Quad­bi­kes are also not per­mit­ted on the major nati­o­nal roads, whi­ch makes lon­ger dis­tan­ce jour­neys on them much slower. My advi­ce is to avoid all of the­se issu­es by hiring a pro­per car, with all the pro­per legal paperwork and licen­se etc, from a legi­ti­ma­te agent. Um carro é mais seguro, trans­ports more peo­ple and lug­ga­ge, and thanks to air con­di­ti­o­ning is much more com­for­ta­ble. A small car boo­ked in advan­ce is likely to work out bet­ter value than a quad­bi­ke boo­ked after arrival.

Outras opções

Bicicletas

Bicy­cles are avai­la­ble for hire in Cre­te and can be a good way of doing short dis­tan­ce journeys.

Táxis

The­re are taxi’s widely avai­la­ble in Cre­te but the pri­ce can vary con­si­de­ra­bly. For occa­si­o­nal lon­ger jour­neys a taxi can be a decent opti­on but make sure the pri­ce is set beforehand.

Ônibus

Buses are the main form of public trans­port on Cre­te and are widely avai­la­ble. The qua­lity has impro­ved in the last deca­de or so and they are now air con­di­ti­o­ned and rea­so­na­bly comfortable.

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