There was a time when Crete woke up to the sound of hooves on stone. The donkey was not just an animal — it was the pulse of the village. Every road, every path, every terraced field knew their sure-footed steps. They carried water before pipes, harvested before tractors, and cared for the sick before ambulances.
In 1950, Greece had over 500,000 donkeys. By 1995, that number had plummeted to 95,000. By 2008, fewer than 15,000 remained — and on Crete, just 1,676. Today, even that feels like a generous guess.
In 2012, there were still three donkeys in Kournas.
Everyone in the village knew them: two worked alongside their owners in the olive groves, carrying tools and firewood. The third belonged to an older man who could no longer walk far — the donkey took him to his plot each morning, waited patiently, then brought him home.
Now they are gone. Not sold, not moved. Gone. Their stables stand empty, the smell of hay replaced by dust.
The disappearance of donkeys is more than the loss of a working animal. It’s the loss of a rhythm. Without them, village mornings are quieter — not in a peaceful way, but in the way a song sounds when a verse is missing.
The gap they leave is also practical. The narrowest mountain paths are not tractor-friendly, and wheelbarrows do not climb like a donkey does. Herbs, water, olives — now they travel by car, or they do not travel at all.
Donkeys were never just “beasts of burden” in Crete. They were partners in survival. They knew the land better than most people, remembered every curve in a path, and could carry twice their weight without complaint — though they might throw you a sideways look if you overdid it.
Now they exist primarily in photographs, children’s books, and festival parades for tourists.
Some small farms and conservation groups are trying to keep the Cretan donkey from disappearing altogether. There are breeders in other parts of Greece who work to maintain strong bloodlines, but here on the island, the breed’s future depends on whether people see donkeys as worth keeping in a mechanised world.
A few dream of bringing them back to community life — walking alongside hikers, carrying herbs from the hills, even working in eco-farms. It is possible. But it will take more than nostalgia; it will take genuine will.
The donkeys of Crete are more than a chapter in a history book — they are part of the island’s memory, muscle, and soul. When they vanish, something human vanishes with them.
Mandali Kournas remembers. The people there still speak about those last three donkeys with the tenderness you reserve for old friends. The rest of Crete should remember too — before the donkey becomes just another tourist photo backdrop, and nothing more.
Because when the donkeys are gone, it is not just their hooves that are missing. It is the sound of a village walking.
Mandali Kournas is not a tourist trap, but a sanctuary of sorts, helmed by Barbara Baukje Vrij. Her donkeys are not podium performers; they are companions named Eos and Cleo (acquired in 2018) and Popy and Zoë (added in 2019). Crete had dwindling donkey numbers, reaching as low as three in Kournas in 2012—used only to haul firewood for some bedraggled locals—so rescuing four was no small task. These donkeys walk, not carry, through thyme-scented trails. No weight, no humiliation—just mutual respect.
Privately, Vrij built something tiny but mighty: donkeys leading, not laboring, preserving an ancestral relationship without exploitation. That is tourism we can admire.
Take a deep breath and think: donkeys shaped our islands. And now, in quiet hills of Crete and shadowy sanctuaries of Athens, those animals get a chance to teach, not toil. Santorini can modernize its shame—or be the poster child of how not to honor our four-legged guardians. Choose differently. Walk the donkey, don’t ride it.
