Day Eighteen| Monday 20th August 2018
City: Athens, Greece
Accommodation: Athens Novatel
Weather: 32
Photo: Approaching Athens by plane
A much shorter post today, as it was mainly transit. We were up at 7am, then breakfast at 8am at the hotel. It was much quieter at the buffet this morning, either people slept in, or had an earlier breakfast than us.
We checked out of the hotel by 9am and caught a taxi to the airport, as it was the most practical and cost-effective way, even though it was about $50AUD. There was a taxi rank directly opposite the hotel which was convenient.
Upon arrival at the airport, we found the check-in desk straight away. It’s actually a bag drop off point, you have to check in using the self-service kiosks first, there is no person to person check-in process. It took one hour from the time we entered the airport until the time we passed through security and were free to roam the terminal.
The flight was with Aegean Airlines and took off only a few mins after the scheduled 11:50am departure. On board there is no entertainment screen, but I had my tablet and phone for music and video. Anthony had his phone and eBook. The meal was a mini tube pasta with a beef sauce, along with cheese and crackers, and a cranberry oat bar.
The landing of the plane was a little bumpy, but we landed safely and on time at 3:40pm. There is a one hour time difference between here and Barcelona, so we’ve jumped ahead an hour. We are now 6.5hrs behind Adelaide. This will change again when we leave Athens and head to Budapest, where we will fall back to 7.5hrs behind. We caught a taxi to the hotel, as public transport would have taken almost 90 mins, and had two connections and at least 15 mins of walking. The taxi took a little over half an hour, arriving at 5pm.
The hotel is quite nice, it’s only a small 7 story building, unlike the 26 floors we had in Barcelona. We’ve read good reviews for the hotel online, but there are negative comments about the surrounding area, that it’s not the safest place to be at night, and people recommend taking a taxi or Uber to and from the hotel. We’ve taken that suggestion on board. It’s not surprising that the area is not the most ideal, I noticed the same thing in the drive through from the airport, much of the city seems old and rundown, a lot probably has to do with the country’s financial problems. If we wanted a hotel right in the heart of the main tourist district, we’d be spending a lot more than the $662 for three nights we are spending here.
We do however have a view of the Acropolis from the hotel window which is quite cool. I spent some time Google Mapping the places we plan to visit tomorrow and the next day, and they are all within a short distance from each other, and all about 2km from the hotel.
We’ll have dinner at the hotel tonight, the restaurant opens at 8pm, which is in about 30 mins time.
tomothy travels 