Metro from Athens airport to Ledra Hotel
Jun 24th, 2005, 02:50 AM
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 9
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Metro from Athens airport to Ledra Hotel
I will be honeymooning in Greece in about 2 months. We arrive in Athens about 6pm on a Monday. What is the best (ie fastest and most economical) way to get to the Ledra Marriott Hotel? We will each only have one piece of luggage with wheels and maybe a book bag. My almost husband speaks Greek well if that helps in the transportation decision. He has also been to Athens before, but before the Metro was put in. I'm a first timer. Thanks for any ideas.
Jun 24th, 2005, 03:58 AM
#2
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 1,546
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I do not think that there is a metro station at airport. Each time when I was in Athens, I took the bus (very confortable and cheap). The bus goes till Sintagma place (the centre of the centre of Athens). It takes one hour from airport to there.
Jun 24th, 2005, 06:22 AM
#4
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 2,330
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Thanks to the Olympics last year the Metro does run to the airport now. Last October it was 8 euro for one person, 12 euro for two. With luggage as light as you mentioned you should easily be able to handle it on the subway. The one from the airport even had a luggage area where you could stack suitcases.
I looked at the Ledra hotel for last October but did not stay there. I think it's about 1 kilometer from a subway stop. A stop on the red line I believe. You'd have to change lines at Syntagma. The ticket price from the airport will cover the change to the other line.
Maybe someone else knows exactly which subway stop is the closest.
I looked at the Ledra hotel for last October but did not stay there. I think it's about 1 kilometer from a subway stop. A stop on the red line I believe. You'd have to change lines at Syntagma. The ticket price from the airport will cover the change to the other line.
Maybe someone else knows exactly which subway stop is the closest.
Jun 24th, 2005, 02:57 PM
#5
Join Date: Feb 2005
Posts: 550
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
We just made the tripfrom the airport to the Marriott a month ago. It was quite easy with one caveat, which will follow.
You walk across the pick-up & drop-off road at the airport to an obvious, large roofed area (which I guess is an open-air train station) and buy a ticket for two to Athens at the Metro window. I think the price has gone down since other people have said it was $8 for 1 and $12 for 2. Now it's $6 and $10, but the diffence might be that the old ticket was good the rest of the day and this one is only good for 90 min. Follow the signs to the tracks - be sure to validate your ticket in the machine you pass before you go down the escalator. Take the Metro, which comes every half hour, to Syntagma station, the next to last one. (Metro ticket guy told us to take the Monastiraki train, but there is no other Metro leaving from the airport.)
At Syntagma station, directions for transferring to the #2 (red) line are easy. You'll go to the Aghios Dimitrios track to go south to the Marriott (not Aghios Antonios, which goes north), but take a couple of minutes to look around the exhibits of antiquities found while excavating for the station (which was pictured in Nat'l Geographic a couple of years ago).
Take the red line two stops to Sygrou-Fix. If you come out the main exit, you'll be in an area between 2 streets. Stay on the smaller one, which will be behind the exit, as I recall. If you're lucky, you'll come out of the other exit on the other side of the correct street. Wish I could explain better here. Leoforos Syngrou Av. is a very large street and much is fenced so you can't cross it, so you don't want to be on the other side when you get to the Marriott. My my husband says he think's it's slightly downhill in the direction of the Marriott. If you can keep a sense of which way the train was going as you exit the station (which, for once, I did), go that way.
Now for the problematic part. Sidewalks the 1-2 km. from the station to the hotel are nonexistent or covered by construction or parked cars and cycles, so your wheeled luggage will require lifting once in awhile. (Get used to the cars parked on the sidewalks.) One street will be a bit difficult to cross but it's narrow and every now and then the traffic thins out enough that you can dash across. And you're going to wonder if you're actually where you should be since it's all commercial buildings and car dealers. We stopped at a news kiosk to be sure. But the Marriott will be down there after awhile - on the left. It was annoying to do but not extremely difficult and we're in our 60s. I'm assuming you're younger and should be able to manage some bag lifting and bouncing around construction. If you don't want to do the walk from Syngrou-Fix, you could exit at Syntagma and take a taxi, which the hotel said would be about $7. (Though in my experience, every time someone said a fare would be X it was X plus 15-20%.) Taxi from the airport will be about $25-$30, depending on traffic.
You'll either be doing some walking or some Metro-riding since the Marriott isn't terribly convenient to the Plaka and other areas of interest. The distance to the Acropolis, for example, will be about 3 times as far as from the S-F Metro station to the Marriott. So it's either a long walk or a short Metro ride. But the Metro is clean and easy to use. We stayed at the Marriott (on points) when we arrived and at the Attalos when we returned after island visits, and the Attalos was certainly far more conveniently located. While I was pleasantly surprised by the Attalos room, including the size, you'll have a larger and more luxurious room at the Marriott - in addition to a pool, fitness facilities, etc.
Though we took a taxi to the airport for our early flight to Santorini, we took the Metro again when we left for home since our flight wasn't until noon. Although I don't know what times the Metro leaves the airport, it leaves Monastiraki Station every half hour on the :21 and :51 and will arrive at Syntagma station a minute or two later. But you do have to be careful when returning to the airport since most of the trains in that direction do not go all the way. Be sure you take one that says Airport, not one that says Ethniki Amyna (in Syntagma Sta. there's an electronic sign so you don't have to rely completely on the sign on the front of the train).
Have a wonderful trip. You'll love it.
You walk across the pick-up & drop-off road at the airport to an obvious, large roofed area (which I guess is an open-air train station) and buy a ticket for two to Athens at the Metro window. I think the price has gone down since other people have said it was $8 for 1 and $12 for 2. Now it's $6 and $10, but the diffence might be that the old ticket was good the rest of the day and this one is only good for 90 min. Follow the signs to the tracks - be sure to validate your ticket in the machine you pass before you go down the escalator. Take the Metro, which comes every half hour, to Syntagma station, the next to last one. (Metro ticket guy told us to take the Monastiraki train, but there is no other Metro leaving from the airport.)
At Syntagma station, directions for transferring to the #2 (red) line are easy. You'll go to the Aghios Dimitrios track to go south to the Marriott (not Aghios Antonios, which goes north), but take a couple of minutes to look around the exhibits of antiquities found while excavating for the station (which was pictured in Nat'l Geographic a couple of years ago).
Take the red line two stops to Sygrou-Fix. If you come out the main exit, you'll be in an area between 2 streets. Stay on the smaller one, which will be behind the exit, as I recall. If you're lucky, you'll come out of the other exit on the other side of the correct street. Wish I could explain better here. Leoforos Syngrou Av. is a very large street and much is fenced so you can't cross it, so you don't want to be on the other side when you get to the Marriott. My my husband says he think's it's slightly downhill in the direction of the Marriott. If you can keep a sense of which way the train was going as you exit the station (which, for once, I did), go that way.
Now for the problematic part. Sidewalks the 1-2 km. from the station to the hotel are nonexistent or covered by construction or parked cars and cycles, so your wheeled luggage will require lifting once in awhile. (Get used to the cars parked on the sidewalks.) One street will be a bit difficult to cross but it's narrow and every now and then the traffic thins out enough that you can dash across. And you're going to wonder if you're actually where you should be since it's all commercial buildings and car dealers. We stopped at a news kiosk to be sure. But the Marriott will be down there after awhile - on the left. It was annoying to do but not extremely difficult and we're in our 60s. I'm assuming you're younger and should be able to manage some bag lifting and bouncing around construction. If you don't want to do the walk from Syngrou-Fix, you could exit at Syntagma and take a taxi, which the hotel said would be about $7. (Though in my experience, every time someone said a fare would be X it was X plus 15-20%.) Taxi from the airport will be about $25-$30, depending on traffic.
You'll either be doing some walking or some Metro-riding since the Marriott isn't terribly convenient to the Plaka and other areas of interest. The distance to the Acropolis, for example, will be about 3 times as far as from the S-F Metro station to the Marriott. So it's either a long walk or a short Metro ride. But the Metro is clean and easy to use. We stayed at the Marriott (on points) when we arrived and at the Attalos when we returned after island visits, and the Attalos was certainly far more conveniently located. While I was pleasantly surprised by the Attalos room, including the size, you'll have a larger and more luxurious room at the Marriott - in addition to a pool, fitness facilities, etc.
Though we took a taxi to the airport for our early flight to Santorini, we took the Metro again when we left for home since our flight wasn't until noon. Although I don't know what times the Metro leaves the airport, it leaves Monastiraki Station every half hour on the :21 and :51 and will arrive at Syntagma station a minute or two later. But you do have to be careful when returning to the airport since most of the trains in that direction do not go all the way. Be sure you take one that says Airport, not one that says Ethniki Amyna (in Syntagma Sta. there's an electronic sign so you don't have to rely completely on the sign on the front of the train).
Have a wonderful trip. You'll love it.
