Nice View over Pitsidia
Pitsidia (Greek Πιτσίδια (n. Pl.)) Is a village in the south of the Greek island of Crete, a few kilometers northeast of the famous tourist resort of Matala. It belongs to the municipality of Festos as part of the municipal district Tymbaki.
Pitsidia is the administrative center of the homonymous village.
Pitsidia - 666 inhabitants, Matala - 67 inhabitants, Neo Kalamaki - 27 inhabitants
Although since the 70s, a gentler tourism has established itself compared to Matala - first carried by "dropouts", then increasingly by individual tourists - the local structure has changed relatively little. So there is still no big hotel, but a lot of small and smallest pensions. The small village with the Plateis, the village square in the center, rearrange a variety of smaller and larger holiday homes of various equipment. Meanwhile, the place and its surroundings, for example, the neighboring village of Sivas, strongly influenced by German-speaking (partial) resettlers, many houses are bought. The previously strikingly high proportion of German teachers has now reduced to no more noteworthy, even if some Crete travel guides note this as a special feature.
Pitsidia lies about 800 meters from the sea because of a large archaeological reserve. Tourist importance of the long stretched beach Komos, which extends to Kalamaki at the southwestern end of the Messara plain.
Pitsidia is the oldest village in the area. The historian Stergios Spanakis suspected that here was the base of the army of the Byzantine general Nikephoros II Phokas. The name of the place is derived from Pisidia, the home of Byzantine soldiers. After Kastrofilaka Pitsidia had in the year 1583 89 inhabitants and at the census of 1834 30 Christian families were recorded in the village.
In the village there are several churches: the Agios Georgios, the Agia Paraskevi, the Agios Ioannis, the Agios Stefanos and the beach of Komos of Agios Panteleimon. There is also a small church at the old well, which is dedicated to the water.
On Komos beach there are the Minoan excavations of the port city Kommos, which are fenced. In the olive groves between Pitsidia and Kamilari, the ruins of the temple were uncovered by loggos and an estate.