Petras is an excavated Minoan town on a low hill at the southern edge of Sitia, with views across the bay. It was occupied from around 2500 BC through the Late Minoan period and has yielded some of the most important Linear A archives outside the major palaces — an unusual find for a smaller settlement.
The site is open to the public with a small admission fee. There is little signage and almost no shade; an hour with a good site map is enough. Many of the finest finds from the digs are on display in the Sitia museum a kilometre away.