The small village of Maleme, only 17 km from Chania with it's famous old town and the Venetian harbour, is a holiday paradise in the prefecture of Chania. It offers quiet and relaxing vacations but also night life in the bars of the area or in the village of Platanias, only 4 km from Maleme. As well, the village offers many choices of tavernas and quality shops. It has kept its original Cretan flavour unspoilt from the massive tourist trade, offering an excellent base to organise numerous countryside daily excursions to the most photogenic places of the Chania county.

Maleme is best known as the place where German paratroopers attacked Crete in 1941. Most of those young men lost their life in the attack and are laid to rest in the German war cemetery. Maleme was where the old airport ofChania, which has now been abandon-ed, was situated. North of the village, at a place called Kafkalos, a vaulted late Minoan tomb, which had been plundered and only contained some potsherds and two seal-stones, was discovered.