Early morning flight out of Athens.

For this question my suggestion is always the same:

Unless you are staying at the extremely expensive Sofitel it will take you at least 10/15 minutes to reach the airport by taxi from a nearby hotel, and from Athens it will takes about 45 minutes to get to the airport.

So by wanting to get closer to the airport you will gain around 30 minutes of sleep but you will lose almost an entire day in Athens by having to check out the day before and go to an uninteresting suburban hotel.

When I have an early flight from Athens (which happens quite often) I pre-book a taxi with Welcome Pickups to be at the airport about 1.5 to 2 hours before the flight.

The taxi fare before 5 a.m. is around €15 to €20 more than during the day.

Then it turned out my flight would be at 6 am (gulp!).

You should fire your travel agent

:-)

@Joe. Alas I have only my penny pinching ways to blame😀. I wanted to use Frequent Flyer miles for the flight and that was actually the best connection available. Good thing I am usually an early riser,……

We stayed Avra in Rafina which has a shuttle to the airport. Our situation was different than yours though. We did not move out of central Athens for our last night but rather came from Meteora and needed to take a flight from the airport the next day.

We did not take the shuttle as we had a rental car. It took us about 15-20 minutes.

Like Jolui, I would either stay at the airport or book a very early cab ride from central Athens.

How much time have you had in Athens during your trip?

Regardless of where you stay you'll be getting up early and saving 30 minutes of sleep by staying at an expensive hotel near the airport won't gain much sleep.

Enjoy your last night in Athens where there is so much to see, do and experience.

As the old saying goes: "You'll sleep when you are dead"!

We love the Sofitel. We have stayed there many times for departures later than yours. Enjoy the spurge.

Thanks to everyone for some great and very helpful input. I found myself a bit torn. Then I thought about my travel patterns. I would not be spending that last night “out on the town” but hunkered down in a hotel room anyway. People made good points about time lost transferring hotels but I think I will have them store luggage and make that transfer after a day of sightseeing. Finally, I am going to splurge on the Sofitel. I can compensate for this by just adding a day of substitute teaching to my schedule in the next month or so.

I am very fortunate that my two hobbies (spending time teaching children) and traveling work so well together. One pays for the other😀.

If you arrange with a good service, as others have offered, then staying in the city center is fine. It will take 45 minutes.

Often, in the interest of avoiding going into Athens just for one final night, we stay in Mati or Rafina on the water. Those are each about 20 minutes away from the airport.

Both are amply charming for spending a final evening. The hotel we use in Mati has a shuttle that would (at last check) arrange for a shuttle at that hour for a small charge.