My daughter and a few friends want to travel to Greece from mid-west USA for a post-grad celebration trip. Three early twenties girls traveling alone! Any advice and itinerary suggestions? I suspect they are getting all of their information from social media sites. I've never been to Greece so don't have any advice to offer. They want to "island hop" too! Flying into and out of Athens.
Posted by
4434 posts
I would let them do all the planning--they will be fine!
In all seriousness, the only thing I would do is remind them of what you likely already instilled--to watch out for one another. The rest is a learning experience.
Posted by
France Southwest
1823 posts
If they can avoid relying on social media to organize their trip, that would be a first step.
Then why not remind them of the existence of real travel guides, or possibly to go check the official Greek website?
Posted by
OP
2 posts
Thanks! They do want to do the planning! But of course it's hard to do. Planning all the exact specifics is daunting. They think this itinerary as a goal:
Athens 21st arrive and stay 2 nights 21st-22nd night
mykonos 23-24th
santorini 24th-27th
Paros 28th-30
Athens 31st
Fly out the 1st
Posted by
4434 posts
I have gotten great info from travel blogs over the years. I still use paper travel guides, but putting a book in the hands of a 20 something seems unlikely if it has not happened already. Rough Guide and Lonely Planet both have online guides that can help with transit info. With that computer in their pocket, they can look up ferry schedules and anything else they need to know.
They should consider flying to an island the day they arrive--that saves from having to go back and forth to Athens and having to split the stay there. It helps maximize the time they have, but it requires hanging out in the airport for a couple hours to make sure they have time to make the second flight (since it is booked separately). Of course it depends on their arrival time, but I would at least check the flights from ATH to the islands and then they can work their way back to Athens by ferry/flight.
Looks like they are well on their way with the plan!
Posted by
France Southwest
1823 posts
Indeed, we can clearly see the influence of social media :-))
In order to return to real life, know that island hopping does not consist of going from one island to another as quickly as possible, but of staying on the island to visit it.
Every time you move from an island to another you have to check out of your accommodation, transfer to the port, wait for the ferry, travel by ferry, transfer from the port to the accomodation and check in your accomodation.
So a transfer between 2 islands can take almost the whole day.
According to this schedule, their stay in Mykonos will only last one evening. The next day they will have to leave to take the ferry.
2 full days in Santorini.. why not.
There's no point going to Paros only to stay there on the 29th. the 28th and 30th will be dedicated to travel logistics.
With only 9 days, they have to remove an island from this schedule.