Petousis Hotel & Suites — Hotel in Municipality of Malevizi

We stayed in one of the rooms with a private shared pool for 11 days in May 2025.

The room: Divided between an upper (bed, bathroom, shower) and lower area (seating and door to the pool and outside). Large and comfortable bed. Powerful and roomy shower. Two TVs (comically close to each other). TVs do not have Netflix / Amazon Prime apps, we used our firestick. Comfortable seating in lower area.

Private deck/pool: 6 of the rooms in the hotel have private shared pools - 3 pools with two rooms per pool. There are hedges between the 3 pools and the main pool area. You do get some privacy, but share with your neighbours. Private pools are 1.4m? deep and reasonably large (about 4m by 10m?). Water in May was pretty chilly though, even though the pools are in the sun for most of the day. The area between the sliding door to the room and the private pool has 2 recliners, 2 chairs, a table and a parasol. This area is reasonably large (4m by 2m?) and private (walls to either side). Note that the 'roof' of this area is wooden beams, so you need to move the recliners towards the pool unless you really want a stripey tan.

Main pool / outdoor area: There are three bigger pools available to everyone. Two of these are in an upper area, one being a large 1.4m? pool and the other being a kids pool directly beside it. There's another large pool in a lower area. There are recliners everywhere and the whole area has tables. There's gym and shower room as well as toilets. Many of the tables back on to the hotel's bar area which has sliding doors to open up at night.

Hotel areas: Hotel is spread across 4 adjacent locations - main building, two other buildings to either side (one on the other side of a side road) and the private pool rooms. Note that Google Maps is out of date and doesn't show much of this (in May 2025 at least). Reception is accessible via the side road (main entrance) and a door to the Petousis Restaurant (only open from noonish). Small and comfy area, leading to the bar and breakfast areas. Bar area is fine, with a few tables and snack menu. Breakfast area is large with the usual selection of food (note that gluten-free was a challenge although the staff tried their best).

Staff: Generally good and friendly staff throughout the hotel, with differing levels of English. Anna on the main reception was a star, with an excellent can-do helpful attitude, she gave us accurate and honest guidance re tours etc. The other staff were also good, but she excelled.

Petousis Restaurant: Built into the same building as the hotel, we spent many an evening in here. It is excellent, with a huge menu of Greek cuisine that was delicious and well-priced. Staff were great as well and went out of their way to help. Note that they kept giving us free desserts and shots of raki at the end of each meal. Restaurant was also full of locals, which is always a good sign. We loved this place.

Beach: The beach is about a ~5 minute walk from the hotel in a straight line. Beach itself is sandy, although there is an area of pebbles between you and the sea, so shoes are recommended. There are plenty of recliners around, but we didn't use them so I'm not sure who they belong to. Water is clear and warm (warmer that the hotel pools in mid May!).

Location: The hotel is quite far west of Heraklion, and somewhat isolated. There are however a few restaurants / shops around, and bus stops directly outside. We didn't feel that we were missing anything, and we appreciated the quieter neighbourhood. Maxim Restaurant was a few minutes walk to the West and is recommended (it's even nicer than the Taverna, although more upmarket / expensive).

Safety: We felt safe at all times. One thing to note is that there are staff around the main pool areas, but if you have kids with you (we didn't) the private pools would need constant supervision as they're hidden from view.

Rating: This is marketed as a 4 star hotel and that feels about right.

Overall: A very good place to stay in Crete. Highly...

We did not like this hotel for a few reasons: the rooms included very little amenities. We had a very limited set of towels, no slippers, no water and no cosmetics (this last point was fixed after talking to the reception) when we came into the room (although a bottle of wine was offered - but we do not drink wine). The sheets were too small and did not cover the whole bed. The room followed a modern design, which included a shower opening on the sofa/beds - we are not fond of these modern designs and prefer separated bathrooms: even though we could have seen this on the pictures, it was not obvious. This point is more related to personal preferences though. The room that we got had a view over the swimming pools and was right above the taverna, making it a bit noisy if you're a light sleeper.

The breakfast ends at 10, we found this to be very early, especially on a vacation mood - as a matter of fact, this is the earliest breakfast closing time of the 3 hotels that we visited in Crete. It was served in a little room near the reception that tended to be pretty full. It is disappointing given the presence of a terrasse overlooking the pool. The breakfast itself lacked quality and quantity. The previous 4-star hotels that we visited in Crete set a high standard, and we left very disappointed after each breakfast in this hotel.

The beach nearby is not up to Crete standards. There is a factory nearby and the sand is full of plastic. It was empty all the time we were there, for a reason. If you intend on choosing this hotel because of the beach, don't, there are plenty of significantly better beaches.

The surroundings are okay. The taverna seems to be very appreciated by the locals (always full), and there is a supermarket nearby but not much more. The hotel is 10 minutes away from the city by car which is very decent. Please note that there are multiple parkings that are offered by the hotels, but they do not belong only to the hotel. The parking in front of the taverna was often full, but the others had space.

Now to the positive: the swimming pools are amazing, the hotel offers access to two swimming pools that were often empty at that time of the year. We enjoyed very much chilling there. The staff that took care of us was also great, they tried to accommodate us as they could. (We requested cosmetics and extra towels, which lacked in the room and they were happy to solve these problems).

Overall, we find this hotel to be lacking comparing to other 4-stars in the region. We understand that the rooms follow a style that many people might appreciate and that is up to personal preferences, but the rooms themselves lack amenities that a 4-star hotel should provide (water, cosmetics, slippers, extra towels, sheets covering the whole bed, etc). For the price we paid (~110€/night), we expected better in...

First time travelers to Greece and of course Crete. We booked our vacation via local agency and we just choose the location(Petousis) from several other locations in popular Crete locations(Hersonissos, Rethymnon) based on pictures and reviews. The hotel itself is absolutely best, accompanied by a huge restaurant/taverna(probable the best in Gazi area). Hotel: we were accommodated in the main building 2nd floor., the room was on the taverna side and with see view. During the evenings, one can hear noise from the restaurant, not really annoying. Room was very spacious, clean and with all the necessary amenities. Room was refreshed and cleaned on a daily basis. The hotel as 2 public swimming pools with separate kids areas. The one on the side is an older one but nevertheless clean and fine. The main one is modern, infinity edge style, bigger and perfect. Hotel personnel was very welcoming, attending to our needs and questions. Special thanks to the front desk team: Maria, Helena and Haris. Breakfast was also nice with many choices for every taste. The room itself was not very big and tended to get crowded at popular morning hours. Not really an issue, just go with 20min earlier or later than everyone else. The beach is ~200-300m/5-6min from the hotel with plenty of beach bars to choose from. Taverna: As mentioned, of considerable size with no problems in finding a free table. For families, there is also a monitored kids playing area. The food choice ranged from classic pizza/pasta to local specialties. Very tasty, generous portions and with decent prices, complete with complementary sweets and local raki. Amiable personnel(many thanks Evgheni) Transport: Roxani bus station is literally on the front door of the restaurant but if you want to roam around Crete, a rented car is the best choice. On this subject, the rental places will try to overcharge once they see you are a tourist. Luckily, there are a lot of local cheap car rental options. Take your time and go visit as many as you can and you'll find the best offer. Some are shadier, some looking more legit. Ask them to show you the exact car, avoid old ones and definitely avoid paying with credit card. Pay in cash in advance. Do not be afraid to negotiate the price. All in all, we had a very pleasant and relaxed vacation and we definitely want to go back to Petousis Hotels and...