Maria Complex

Enjoyed a wonderful weeks holiday in Sissi and would recommend the Maria Complex. Had a clean room, the pool area was great. The Hotel people are very friendly and made you feel very relaxed.
I would recommend Sissi as a location we anyone how just wants to get away and have a peaceful and relaxing time away with out the drama's of the big resorts like Malia for example.
Great variety of restaurants within the area. Never had a bad meal and all meals were very much above average.

having recently returned from holiday here, we can quite honestly say it was one of our favourite greek holidays. we booked a studio for 3, balcony overlooking the orange and banana trees, immaculately clean, plenty of hot water, adequate crockery and cutlery, kettle, hairdryer etc. maria and her family were genuinely friendly, giannis even asked me if i wanted to stay all summer and work behind the bar ha ha.the food and drinks were reasonable and their special pizza at 5 euros was really tasty. he also serves beautifully chilled alfa beer on draft (not the cheap all.inc hotel stuff) we will definately return

A lovely chilled out resort with typical warm Greek hospitality. Ideal for couples and families. The apartments are clean and well looked after. The pool is also clean and the bar sells a wide range of drinks and snacks (Greek and English) at decent prices. The landscape surrounding the complex is very humbling. BBQ night is a good evening where there is lovely Cretan cuisine on offer followed by Cretan Circle Dancing which is very good fun.

Spent 2 wonderful weeks at Marias warm and friendly sissi is a lovely place to visit, plenty of Tavernas and bars though quiet enough if you like it that way.
Marias pool is clean and great for kids, the bar is open until the early hours and snacks are served all through the day at reasonable prices.
We will be back this year for sure.

4 readers found this review helpful

Sissi is a fine little resort and definitely worth visiting for a holiday but not for the young and wild. Sandy beaches are limited (try Bufos) but it has enough places to eat and drink, especially try to eat at Liofito, on the main road out of the village, (Mike’s has a “plate for women”!), and have a drink at Peggy Gordon’s.
Hire a bike (Roadrunner at the western end of the resort give a pleasant service) and head along to the bigger, sandy beaches at Malia. While you are there do some shopping because it’s cheaper than Sissi and car hire is cheaper in Malia. In fact Malia is a decent resort and we were surprised, given its reputation.
For transfer to and from the airport we used Holiday Taxis: £28 compared to £70 with Thomas Cook!
Good things at Maria’s. The bar area is fine and the young woman who looked after the bar (whose name I’ve forgotten) is very pleasant. The apartments are located only a couple of minutes walk from the village central area but far enough away to be peaceful.
Now then, over the past twenty years my wife and I have had at least one holiday every year in Greece: at first with our children but now just us. So, we’ve experienced (and enjoyed) the idiosyncrasies of a Greek holiday and stayed in all types of accommodation. We weren’t first-timers to Greece but seasoned travellers. If Maria’s was to be ranked against all of the other accommodation, well, it would be at the bottom.
When considering the provision just put “lack of” in front of everything and you’ll get the idea.
Self-catering in Greece and you expect to have a limited supply of cutlery and crockery but not a lack of space to prepare and eat the food. Our room had just enough space to walk around without scraping your shins on the bed. Preparing and eating could only be done on the small balcony which was only big enough for two chairs and a small table. Luckily Sissi has some good restaurants, so we were able avoid having to eat anything but breakfast at the apartment.
Hot water in Greece is always a bit of lottery but not at Maria’s; you don’t get any. Not quite true, we did one day but just for the day. Get showered at the beach, the water is warmer. If you do take a cold shower at Maria’s and drop the soap behind the toilet, just leave it! Alright, the bathroom at home doesn’t get cleaned every day but I would make sure it was cleaned regularly if people were staying. I’d also make sure they had linen without stains and holes.
The pool didn’t have a lack of sunbeds. In fact, there were so many packed around the pool that you could hardly get to one without standing on someone and you couldn’t roll over or you’d finish up rolling onto your neighbour. At least this prevented you from falling down the uncovered manhole!
‘Keep calm and carry on’ because any complaint will be met with sincerity but treated with indifference.
That’s how it was for us in September. There were other minor points but let’s leave those. Yes, it’s cheap at Maria’s but cheap doesn’t have to mean nasty.
Things are financially tough at the moment in Greece but in Sissi we found that treating tourists cynically like cash-cows isn’t the way to encourage us to return to support their tourism industry. Examples are the lack of respect at Maria’s and not bothering to make an effort (so we didn’t bother spending much time financing the bar) , the Alpha supermarket in Sissi charging €1.62 for a peach and a banana, and Genesis cycle hire wanting to charge €5 for one day or €14 for two days! Thankfully, this is only a small minority and most of those working in Greek tourism aren’t like this. Earlier this year, our holiday on Kos was absolutely fine (see our review for Olga’s Paradise: cheap but certainly not nasty!).

3 readers found this review helpful

Having just returned from a fortnight stay at Maria’s I can honestly say I have never experienced anything like it.
The Maria website states all rooms have a kitchenette..no they don’t.(although they blame the travel agents for not correcting THEIR misinformation.)...it also says you will receive a warm and friendly greeting from Yannis and staff...no you won’t..(a more surly and unfriendly man I have never met and his petty pranks (like removing the air-conditioning key whilst we were out) were the low point of our holiday). The room we had was absolutely NOT suitable for 2 adults to share for 2 weeks and the double bed took up virtually the whole of the floor-space with no room for 2 people to walk around it. When you opened the door to the room it hit the bed and you had to squeeze along the side of the bed to be able to shut it... There were no storage drawers etc so we could not unpack for the whole fortnight. There was NO kitchenette as advertised and when we asked to move to a room more suitable we were told that we had not paid enough and anyway they were fully booked...well the holiday was still available to book via teletext etc (cheaper than we had paid) and the board outside the apartments offered rooms for rent..!!
The bed linen was changed once during our stay and towels (hard as sandpaper) were replaced twice. The bathroom floor was mopped only the once the whole fortnight. So cleanliness is not a high priority at the Maria.
If you are a backpacker staying for a night or so this is a cheap option..but, for any longer there are hotels and rooms in Sissi that are much better and nicer. Also remember that this hotel is a good five- six minute walk from the town down a steep incline and the road is quite busy with scooters cars , buggy’s and coaches speeding up and down.
Sissi is the most charming place and all of the other people we met were so different from Yannis and his staff.
Give this place a wide berth..!!

1 reader found this review helpful

We have just returned from a weeks stay at the Maria apartments, We found the accomodation poor regarding the cleaning, towels only changed once and sheets not changed at all, all that appeared to be done was empty the bins, the floor was dirty, sink and shower tray never cleaned once in the bathroom, and also toilet smelly.The kettle lead was to short to plug in socket, we had to turn saucepan upside down on some towels so that the lead reached the socket.Also the fridge seal was filthy dont think it had ever been cleaned. In saying all this we thought Sissi a lovely place and would return again, but not to the Maria apartments. We have stayed in various places all over Greece and this accomodation was the worse.

1 reader found this review helpful

it was a stunning place and fantastic holiday. my boyfriend decided to propose whilst staying and i wouldn't wish for a nicer friendlier place to get engaged.
go to maria apartments sissi for beauty, frindships, traditional food, family atmosphere, you will go back!
zoe and russell

6 readers found this review helpful

We stayed at the Maria Complex, we found it very clean, pleasent and comfortable. The pool was just the right size. Maria and Yannis made us feel very welcome.
The hotel is a comfortable distance away from the main village and harbour, about 10m minutes easy walk.
The food was very good in all the taverners especilly Mamma Mia's and Remezzo's.
Despite there being no beach within easy access we would definatly go back there again.
If staying there for longer than one week I would recomend a car for a few days.

5 readers found this review helpful

Me and my boyfriend have just returned from our holiday in Sissi. Crete. We have been on a number of greek holidays so we know what's good bad averagr acc. and we were pleasently suprised when we got to our clean little appartment. the drain was sometimes a bit whiffy in w.c. but nothing too serious and this was the only minor fault. the owner Yannis more than made up for this , always there making you feel welcome when your down by the pool or at the bar! With a good bunch staying at hotel the same time and the picturesque harbour of Sissi it made for a wicked holiday and we would deffinatley go back again. Gem and Andy.