| : Hello everyone, I'm Alexandra and welcome back to another video here with us where we will be sharing with you some information about our beautiful town of Ajusn Goloft. We hope everyone is staying safe, staying healthy and staying positive during these very difficult times. For today's video we will be looking into the very first hotel built in Ajusn Goloft which goes by the name of Minos Beach Hotel. It all started when the area sparked international awareness during the period of the mid-1950s when French film director Jules Dassin chose Ajusn Goloft as his location for his famous movie He Who Must Die in 1957 based on the work of Nikos Kazantzakis' Christ Recrucified. Then in the early 1960s, under the mayorship of Roussos Kapetanakis, businessman Eleni Narkou and Ilias Otyrhos, who at the time visited the area as friends of film director Nikos Koundouros, proposed the construction of a hotel near the area of Amoudi in Ajusn Goloft and at that time that site was owned by the local authorities. When the actual proposal got accepted it resulted in the establishment of a new company which was called Ajusn Goloft Tourism Enterprises which was founded in 1963 with the involvement of the local government in their initial investment plan of 20% and the construction of Minos Beach Hotel. Now Minos Beach Hotel was the first deluxe hotel on Crete and the third deluxe hotel in the whole of Greece. Amongst so many world famous guests, notable mentions must include Walt Disney, the crew of Apollo 13 after their landing on the moon, and famous Greek noblest poet Yorgos Soferis. As you can imagine such names did spark a lot of awareness and definitely put the town of Ajusn Goloft on the international map of holiday destinations. Now the hotel of Minos Beach gave Ajusn Goloft a head start in terms of the tourism industry on Crete and since its establishment it has given a warm Greek welcome to countless of visitors from all over the world. During the early 1970s the hotel was then bought by entrepreneur Mr Georgios Mamidakis who at the time was already operating in the region and he was supplying cargo ships that were travelling through the Suez Canal. With the passing of the time the hotel did remain within the Mamidakis family and is now under the leadership of its successor Ms Dina Mamidakis. Its history and its close relationship with art is one of the things that has made Minos Beach so unique. Under her guidance the hotel was then renamed to Minos Beach Art Hotel as it hosts numerous of art installations from the entrance of the hotel through the lobby, the gardens and the ocean bed where one can admire the contemporary art that has been collected throughout the years. The open air museum of Minos Beach at the moment consists of 54 art installations by both leading international and local artists. Nowadays the hotel still offers high quality luxury experience. Minos Beach's success gave rise to the establishment to many other luxury hotels in and around the area of Agios Nikolaos and you can actually find them available on our website. So I think that is everything from us for today's video. We really hope you enjoyed this one and hopefully you have gained more insight on how tourism began in Agios Nikolaos and the important role that Minos Beach played in the process. So once again thank you for watching. We will see you in our next video and until then stay safe. Bye. |
