Athens-Crete-Santorini help
 

I'll be traveling to Greece with friends in late October and have learned a great deal from the forum, as usual. I'd appreciate comments on our itinerary and advice on logistics:

Day 1: Arrive Athens, fly to Crete
Days 2-4: Rent car, tour western half of Crete, hike Samaria Gorge (if open), visit Knossos, stay in Chania for 3 nights, move to Heraklion for the 4th
Day 5: Early morning catamaran to Santorini, overnight in Oia
Day 6: Evening flight to Athens, stay 2 nights, have 1 full day for touring
Day 8: Fly back to U.S.

I know it's a rushed schedule but it's all the time we can carve out. My questions are:

Is the catamaran (www.ferries.gr/hfd/) reliable? comfortable? It seems impossible to fly inter-island without going through Athens, which takes too much time.

We thought that staying near the Athens airport at the end of our week would be wise since we are arriving late one night and leaving early one morning, with just a day between. The Holiday Inn is 108 euros/night with an airport shuttle. We'd take the metro into Athens city center or hire a taxi driver for our day of touring. Does this make sense or are there hotels in the city center that provide an airport shuttle?

Any suggestions for Crete would be appreciated. We prefer small villages to resort towns. Is 3 nights in Chania too much (we have to be in Heraklion on the 4th night for the ferry)? We travel very light, so moving hotels isn't a problem. Should we spend the 3rd night somewhere else?

Any recommendations for car rentals on Crete? Ideally we would pick up in Chania and drop of in Heraklion.

Thanks so much!

I just did Athens-Crete-Santorini with 16 nights. I would just stay in Athens both nights at the end, taxis are everywhere and you can take an early morning one. We took one at 4:30am. 3 nights is good for Chania, especially if you have a car to see outlying areas. If you click on my screen name you will see a recent Crete post where I discussed my trip, and the name of the car rental co. that I used is in there.

Here's the post:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34825175

Thank you! Would you recommend Casa Delfino? I know it's gotten good reviews, but we're also considering Pandora Suites since they have a terrace overlooking the harbor.

Based on a few pics I just saw on the internet of Pandora Suites, it looks similar to Casa Delfino. Except Pandora's decor in the rooms looks more interesting, and if it has a view of the harbor, why not? Do they have a website?

By the way, a tip for Chania- there's the harbor area where Pandora is that is all tourists. Then there is another harbor area if you go through some back streets that is all locals. We went there one night and there was a huge array of clubs and cafes. That's where the nightlife seemed to be.

Does anyone have experience with the catamaran? Apparently, the website is not "official," so we're not really sure if any boats will be running at the end of October. :-(

I've looked at two websites: http://www.ferries.gr/hfd/, and http://tinyurl.co.uk/gc0e, and they both show the Flying Cat 4 sailing four days/week in October. Ferries are reliable, but what can't always be relied upon is the weather. Small passenger-only catamarans are more affected by high winds than their bigger sisters, so it is good to have a backup plan when depending upon them for an island link.