The Palola-Harriman Family Welcomes You to Crete.

“To rest from travel, just find a hotel.  But to grow from the journey, find a home where the journey’s shared with others.”— Anonymous

We are Heidi Palola & Richard Harriman, educators who left our U.S. home on the Atlantic coast of Maine to work and raise our children Margaret & Griffin overseas. Since 2002 we taught and travelled extensively in Europe and the Mideast, with a focus on the Arabian and Balkan Peninsulas and the Aegean Islands. In 2006, after a posting to our first school in Saudi Arabia, we returned to Greece, a country where we had previously taught, but for the first time visited the island of Crete. We spent a summer in the western town of Kissamos, the heart of Crete’s olive region, where all four of us fell head over heels in love with the rural culture, Aegean shoreline, and mountainous landscapes of this amazing area on this amazing island. We decided not only to make this place our home, but to design and build a home where others, too, could share this place and its joys. Completed in 2012, 2015 & 2017, the farm’s three homes have now been serving family, friends, and gatherings from two to twenty-four, providing an intimate retreat where joy, health, family and community are fostered, strengthened and celebrated.

Now retired from teaching, we live year-round at Villa Koukouvayia, hosting guests, managing its small olive farm, while also directing a separate company that supports retreats, creates experiential adventure holidays, and capitalizes on the cultural, recreational, and culinary landscapes now in our backyard.
And having proudly established our home in one of the loveliest places on earth, we are excited to offer you an opportunity to share it with us.