Nitaos is a small plateau, at some 1,200 m: a polje, like all such in Crete.
With neither inhabitants nor agriculture, the plain was only ever used for grazing and fodder. On a small hill, near the eastern access point, is a new-built refuge-shelter of the Mountaineering Association of Chania.
Another shelter (Tauris) built in 1992 lies some 7.5 km from Ammoudari on a dirt-track: it has room for 42 mountaineers.
The ascent by the old path, some 3 km, takes about 2 hours. The region was one of the first developed by the Mountaineering Association of Chania from 1930.
