Getting to athens from Scotland on the cheap, any advice?

iwantitnow

We were booked with easyccruise last year when they cancelled their river cruise programme on Easycruise 2.

As compensation they offered us cabins for this years programme, however they only seem to be operating from Greece/Turkey.

It seems to be impossible to get cheap flights to Athens from Scotland.

Has anybody got any ideas of how we could get to Athens on the cheap from Scotland even if it means taking a lowcost airline to somewhere else in Europe to the go onwards with another lowcost airline

davidlizard

The Athens international airport website has a list of who uses the airport what days of the week. You have to click around a bit to find the information, but there is stuff here http://www.aia.gr/flight_schedule/european_en.htm - its useful as a starting point to see who goes there, but does omit charter flights.

We have just gone through a similar exercise in finding the cheapest way to get to Athens for September, but from London so its not too relevant for you. We found Aegean (flying from Stansted) to be the cheapest, BA and Easyjet were similar prices, and Olympic being the most expensive. But we have only explored direct scheduled flights. In the past we have considered using Alitalia (via Rome), Swiss (via Geneva) and Air Berlin (via Munich) but did not find the savings worth the hassle of taking two flights.

Other options are getting a charter flight to Crete, where there are several daily boats to Pireaus. Santorini and Mykonos also have daily ferries to Athens, but it is unlikely you will find any cheap flights there.

When you get to Athens International Airport, suggest use the E96 bus which will take you down to Pireaus, and costs around 3 euros each. Don't bother with taxis or the metro (its more expensive and you will need to change).

We saw the Easycruise ship in Naxos and Ios last summer - it looks alright and certainly gives a decent trip around the islands, including some of the less touristy ones.