Flying Crete to Athens, then flight home to US - Connection Time?

There are only a handful of nonstop flights from Crete to Athens each day— about a dozen. If you look at www.Skyscanner.com you will see that sometimes the flights are two hours apart. So, if you book a separate ticket and the flight gets cancelled or delayed, and you’ve cut it too close—there’s a real possibility that you could miss your return flight home. Greece’s earthquake last month is the type of event that has the potential to disrupt flight schedules. So are the summer wildfires that have plagued Greece for several years now. With all this in mind, I would really hesitate to rely on my flight from Crete to make my international return flight from Athens during the same morning or afternoon. If your trip is during the high season, there’s a good chance that the flight immediately following the one you book could be sold out— leaving you high and dry should your flight not depart as scheduled.
And one-way tickets bought at the last minute to return to the U.S.from ATH are likely to be much more expensive— maybe even more expensive than the roundtrip tickets you bought.
If you were planning to visit Athens at the beginning of your trip, you might move it to the end of your trip so you are already in Athens the night before your return flight home.

Since these are two separate tickets, keep the following in mind.....

If you have checked bags you will have to collect them;

You will then have to go through security;

If your flight to the US is nonstop, you will go through Schengen exit immigration at Athens;

You will not pass through customs at Athens arriving from Crete because it is the same country.

If you miss your connection due to a late arriving/delayed flight out of Crete, you will have to buy a new ticket.

What time is your flight to the US out of Athens?

What airlines are you flying?

But my initial thought is fly to Athen the night before your flight to the US.

Here is the flight home from an earlier post:

Depart Athens, Greece: Tuesday, Aug 12 @ 1:05pm
Arrive Spokane, Washington: Tuesday, August 12 @ 11:36pm

It's unclear how many connections are involved.

Give us all the flight information, including airline and flight numbers, and we can tell you where you will be connecting.

What's important is from which airport you'll be leaving Schengen.

Considering the time of your departing flight out of Athens, and it being two separate tickets, I'd still fly into Athens the night before and stay at an airport hotel.

For fun I looked at one way flights from Athens to Spokane on Aug 12. If bought today they would just over $3200.

Aegean Airlines flights on 8/12 from HER to ATH at 6:00am, 8:10am and 9:35am.
Like Frank, I still advise being in Athens the night before your return flight. If you do opt for same-day flights, be sure to buy changeable tickets and/or Travel Insurance. ( for $246, you also could buy tickets for both the 8:10am and 9:35am flights if you want to hedge your bet).
You want to be sure your Honeymoon ends as good as it begins.
Cheers!

Unable to find a 1:05 Athens departure flight that ends at Spokane (GEG)

Found a Delta 1210 departure that has an 1136PM arrival at GEG. ( Goes to ATL)

With checked bags and separate tickets and seemingly exiting the Schengen at Athens, anything less than 3 hours requires a degree of optimism I do not possess.

The 'be in Athens the night before' is really the smartest thing to do.

Thank you all for the feedback. I appreciate the shared experience and details.

If you know where we will be departing from in the airport that would be great.

Here are the flight details

Flight to US

DELTA 241 - Departs at 1:05pm Athens to Boston

Honesty, I have never purchased Insurance for my past travels - always relying upon a solid CC company that has backed me up in the bad spots. Yet, I was a solo traveler and adventure was part of life. This...Honeymoon feels different :)

We did purchase travel insurance for our International tickets and we added travel insurance as we booked each of our BnB locations. It felt a little excessive in the moment. However, it is reassuring to know we have multiple sources of coverage. As well as multiple angles of coverage- whether it is medical, flight issues, or natural disasters.

If we purchase the Crete 6:10am to 6:55am flights we would have 6 hrs until departure and 5 hrs until boarding.

I found the Flight Detail Crete/Ath

Flight - Crete to Athens

Aegean A37008 - 6:10am to 6:55am

Flight - Athens to Boston

DELTA 241 - Departs at 1:05pm

Color me puzzled.

When I search the Delta site for ATH-BOS flight 241 shows up.

When I search for ATH-GEG, Delta has no routing that goes through BOS.

Do you have a separate ticket for BOS-GEG?

Our Tickets from GEG to ATH and ATH to GEG were all purchased at one time.

Flights home. Just pulled them off Delta

Athens to Boston: DL0241

Boston to Salt Lake City: DL0445

Salt Lake City To GEG: DL3222

In practice, I don't actually see any problem with this 6-hour connection time in Athens. A 3-hour connection time would work just as well.

Heraklion Airport is a major international airport that handles tens of thousands of flights per year, in 2024, more than 4.5 million passengers were recorded for the June-July-August period.

You're much more likely to have a sunstroke in Crete, or a car accident on the way to the airport and miss your flight out of Heraklion, than to have your flight canceled due to an earthquake, wildfire, or whatever.

JoLui, Thanks for the reassurance :)

Our flight out of Heraklion to Athens was delayed 1.5 hours for unknown reasons. It was tight to make our scheduled tour at Delphi. I would not have wanted to be taking an international flight that same day.

Personally, taking two unconnected flights with one being international makes me nervous as the cost of missing the international leg is so huge. I do it without hesitation if the second flight is domestic and thus the cost of things going wrong is so much less. Taking a 6 am flight will be no fun anyway so I would return to Athens the night before and stay near the airport.

We have had nine hours between flights and nearly got burned. Fortunately, I was able to change the ongoing flight back to the USA to the next day. I would fly to Athens the night before and stay at the Sofitel Athens Airport rather than risk it. Flights my operate on time or nearly on time until they don't.

Speaking from personal experiences...

In September 2019, for 3 days, there was no way to reach Athens from some islands (I was on one of them). So, logically, I could recommend returning to Athens 4 days before your flight to the USA, but I won't.

However, I've taken numerous domestic flights to Athens from the islands or the mainland. Is that luck or coincidence? I've never experienced the slightest delay on these flights, so I could tell you that a 2.5-hour connection time is sufficient, but I won't.

A long time ago, I also missed flights home from Athens due to ferry cancellations for a day, even though I was broke and couldn't even afford a flight change or an extra day of hotel accommodation. So I could say... never go to an island. But I won't.

So it's up to you... depending on your risk assessment.

The risk level in Missing a flilght to France, vs. one to Western US or Western Canada, is very different ... Jo Lui recognizes that -- and we are all envious of the difference.