Hi --

I was told to leave most of my luggage in Athens before flying out for a tour of Crete and Santorini because the inter-Island flights only allow about 20 lbs of luggage per person.

Is this correct?

IF so, is there an excess luggage fee you pay? If so, how much?

Finally, what are the safest way to store luggage. I will be leaving Athens, touring around, and then returning to Athens (same hotel). Should I store luggage at the hotel?
Or is there a safer way to store it at the airport?

Thanks (as always).

Rick in Maryland

It's probably 20 kgs (44 lbs). lbs are not used in europe. Check with the airline concerned.

If your flight to the island is a continuation of an international flight where the luggage limit is 70 pounds (about 32 kilos), then you can take 70 pounds with you. For us, even though we usually stop in Athens for a day or so, we show our tickets at the airport and say we came from the United States, and we have been able to take our almost 70 pound bags with us without charge.

For purely internal Greek travel, the luggage limit is 20 kilos . This is 44 pounds (not 20 pounds).

Where to store luggage depends on what level of hotel you have. If you are, for example, at the Grande Bretagne, they have a secure luggage room, and that would be a good place to leave it. On the other hand, if you are staying at many (most) Greek hotels, they usually just stack them in the hallway or other unsecured area, so this is not a very good situation for leaving your bags.
There is luggage storage at the airport. I've seen it but never used it, so can't really advise on that point.

Did the same thing last year flying between the Islands never had any problems with luggage weight and I know my bag was a lot heavier than 70 lbs after all the wine I bought in Santorini and Crete.also I had a couple of bags .

Whether or where to store your excess luggage depends upon many factors in addition to cost and security. When we went thru Athens Airport, luggage storage was provided by Pacific Luggage Service, located on the "Arrivals" (lower) level of the terminal. We were departing Athens on 9/3/2005 for Mykonos, Santorini and Crete after almost 3 weeks in Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, Corfu and Athens, with many accumulated purchases and many dirty clothes. We planned to return thru (not to) Athens, so storing the luggage at our Athens hotel would have cost us at least 2-1/2 hrs. plus 50E for roundtrip taxis. Taking the luggage with us on our flight to Mykonos would have been O.K. (provided that they considered the flights part of our international ticket), but on the high speed ferries from Mykonos to Santorini and from Santorini to Crete, the extra luggage would have proved a monumental challenge. We opted to us Pacific luggage serive. These are not lockers. They check in the luggage and issue a receipt; you retrieve your luggage with the receipt and your passport. The process was quick and easy, and cost 109E for 2 huge duffels for 9 full days. Upon our return, we merely wheeled the luggage carrier to our airline and checked it onto our international return flight.