We have done a ton of reading, and are really drawn to these 3 islands.

It "appears" that there are doable ferry connections between them.

Is this workable? Is there an order to see them that would make sense?

We were thinking 4 nights on Santorini, 2 on Folegandros, and 2 on Sifnos, then 1 or 2 at the most in Athens on the way home (only to see the Acropolis, and be close to the airport for our return).

I think whether or not it's workable and the order would depend on the most convenient ferry schedules saving you the maximum amount of time ashore, wouldn't it?

Regarding being close to the airport for your flight home, check out this inexpensive B&B. They offer free shuttle to and from the airport between 8 AM and 10 PM.

http://www.stay-in-athens.com/index.htm

IT is certainly do-able if you have tracked carefully on the ferry websites and hae found ferry skeds that get you from one place to the next.

Sequence? That's totally dependent on the ferries.. the Sifnos link is the trickiest.

Have you taken your arrival & departure dates, and then tried the trio in various orders, to see which sequence has the ferries you need.

With such a limited time, u might consider an aegean air flight for the farthest destination , Santorini -- either outbound if it's 1st or inbound if it's last. Otherwise, a Santorini to Pireaus ferry can take 6-8 hrs.

Yes it is doable and usually the ferries are very convenient for this schedule.

I agree with travelerjan that the best option is to fly to Santorini, and then take the ferry to Folegandros and then Sifnos.

All three islands are excellent choices! Have fun!!

p.s. in Folegandros stay in Chora!

You are planning to travel in May 2009, I believe. Yes, those three islands are doable, but some flexibility is required, as there won't necessarily be daily ferry connections between them that early in the season.

The ferry schedules for next May won't be released until around April, and using this year's timetables to predict when they will run in 2009 is a risky proposition. My guess, because of rising fuel costs, is there will be fewer highspeed sailings in May next year.

Right. So given that we do not have our flights yet, what I was assuming we do is

1) Decide how many days total,

2) Book our flights without really knowing which islands we can do since the ferry schedules are not yet out (?? this seems strange to me, then

3) when do we book accommodations if the May ferry schedules don't come out until April? A month ahead - especially with some of the smaller places that fill up like Folegandros seems too short a time. But if we book and then can't get the ferry connections, what happens?

This is all backward from what I usually do, which is book our hotels, then search for good flights and book those. So the process is confusing to me. Never had to worry about the ferries before with overnights elsewhere.

At what point in the year do the ferries become more regular, or are they never that regular to these islands?

We wouldn't mind doing June, just wanted to lessen the chance of hot weather and crowds, that's why we picked May (thinking Memorial day as our last day, which would be a day at home).

Christine, have you been to Folegandros?

I booked my ferry to Folegandros last May while on Santorini, and found my hotel when I got off the bus at Chora.

Earlier this month (June) I decided which island to visit first when I arrived in Athens. Bought my ferry ticket at the airport, and next morning took the ferry to Mykonos. Found a room in Mykonos Town when I got off the ferry.

This sort of travel is very frustrating for compulsive planners, but believe me, it saves a lot of worry. No island is full in May or even June. Am I a young backpacker? No! I am a 65 yr-old with a sense of adventure.

The best way to plan a trip to the Greek Islands, IMO, is to book your flights, then start doing some research (as you are already doing). Make a tentative plan, then refine it when ferry timetables become available.

FYI, the full summer ferry schedules kick in around mid-June. Ferry timetables for that period become available about mid-May.

Wanderer1, I am not surprised that you feel "at sea" (pun!!) about planning!

Yes, we realize that people usually book accommodations and THEN find transport. But that is for visiting destinations that are big fat pieces of LAND, not little mountaintops peeking up from undersea! These same newcomers to Greece often talk about "basing themselves" on an island and doing day trips to 3-4 others as if the Cyclades were Tuscany. No can do. In Greek Isles you move move move.

As for trip time & schedules:
(1) June would be MUCH better, with more ferries on more days. And as for fearing heat--tho Athens can get very hot in June, the islands are cooler. To prove it, just Go to http://search.weather.yahoo.com/regional/GRXX.html
This week Athens will be in the 90s -- in yr 3 isles, 10 degrees cooler.
ALSO, if u like to SWIM, the water is much more pleasant in june. As for crowds, that's really more July-Aug, tho Santorini is more crowded, as a cruise ship & honeymoon destination.

(2)to check ferry schedules, you can get a rough idea of May or June 2009 ferry schedules by working with the Open Seas website. BRotherLee has explained this FREQUENTLY, if you have used the "Search" function.

You put in 2 ports, ie Folegandros and Sifnos. Then for "date" you click the LH arrow on the little calendar and it goes back to May 2008. Pck a date -- lets say, 3rd Tuesday, and search. Aha! theres a ferry. Now look at 2009 calendar...not for same DATE, but for Tuesdays-- you're most likely to get a ferry then.
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My advice: Lay out your 4-2-2 island plan on a JUne 2009 calendar, and find where it fits best with inter- isle "Regular" ferries. THey are much more likely to stick to established patterns. Base your arrival date on THIS (i.e., 4 days before u want to leave Santorini on a ferry to xx).

Find an o'seas RT flight preferably arriving in the AM (and not departing at the crack o'dawn). For that same arrival day, find an Aegean Air flight to Santorini that allows 3 hrs in between. If it's at a "promotional price" book it. Then look at your Athens hotel options for last 1-2 nights. Then WAIT on the rest.

Don't sweat the hotel thing. Remember once you book a hotel for 2-3 nights u can usually "tweak it" to a day sooner or a day later if the ferry schedule twitches.

Jan, many people came unstuck this year by using the Open Seas 2007 ferry timetables to predict 2008 sailings. One example was FlyingCat 3, which in 2007 stopped 6 days/week at Santorini between Folegandros and Amorgos - this year it bypasses Santorini. Another example: last year Speedrunner I sailed the Western Cyclades, but Aegean Speed Lines sold the ship last winter.

Open Seas is useful for tracking the conventional ferries that operate year-round, but summer catamaran services are notoriously fickle.

This is what we were thinking.

Day 1. Travel from Boston to Athens
Day 2. Arrive in Athens and be met at the airport and transferred to our hotel. Rest, shower, see the Acropolis, walk around the city and go out for dinner in the Plaka (1 Night).
Day 3. Catch the morning boat to Sifnos and stay at the Hotel Petali.
Day 4-6. Enjoy the beauty of Sifnos, shop, eat, drink relax. (3 Days/4 Nights).
Day 7. Catch the Fast Boat from Sifnos to Folegandros and stay in Chora.
Day 8. Enjoy Folegandros and stay one more night. (1 1/2 Days, 2 Nights)
Day 9. Take the Fast Boat to Santorini. Arrive in time for sunset drink and dinner.
Day 10-12. See the archaeological sites and villages, winery, and tour the volcano. (3 1/2 Days, 4 Nights)
Day 13. Fly over the islands and enjoy the aerial views on way to Athens. Back in Athens picked up at the airport up then take a private tour of Delphi or the Argolis.
Back to the hotel in time for rest, shower, pack and then an early dinner.
Day 14. George picks us up and takes us to the airport for our flight home.
Day 15. Day off at Home before work.

I am also thinking, after more research that it may make sense for an agency that handles such things do all this booking and navigating of schedules for us?

One question we had is whether we have (if this itinerary is even doable) too few or too many nights in any one place.

I would appreciate any thoughts on this intinerary, and yes, we are willing to move the dates to June if necessary.

Heimdall -- maybe I should have made this paragraph in all caps:


"My advice: Lay out your 4-2-2 island plan on a JUne 2009 calendar, and find where it fits best with inter- isle "Regular" ferries. THey are much more likely to stick to established patterns. Base your arrival date on THIS."

-- i.e., I did NOT advise relying on Open Seas past skds for FAST-FERRIES of 2009, only "regular" ferries.

PS didn't matter; wanderer apparently paid no attention anyway, posting an itinerary that counts on fast ferries to make it work. Ah well.

Notes to Wanderer:

(1)Most people book a highly-promoted service such as "George the Taxi DRiver" for tours of city or countryside, not for simply being picked up or delivered to airport. IT's up to you. But regular taxis (extremely plentiful!) cost about 30E by day. FRom midnight til dawn you pay 60E (a bit more if your hotel books one ahead) I think the "george" taxis charge quite a lot more; are u planning some sight-seeing en route? Just askin.

(2)On Santorini, be aware that the Akrotiri archeological site probably will still be closed next Spring; the Ancient Thira site is fun but does involve quite a climb even with a car,and it's a good idea to research it onlline -- nothing is marked and it's confusing without advance prep.

(3)As per above post; don't count on those fast ferries.

Okay Jan, I missed the part about "regular ferries", but even so, there are no guarantees some of them will even be running next year, never mind the same days of the week. In particular, I am thinking of GA ferries, several of which are nearing their mandatory retirement dates.

As for the "fast boats", unless fuel costs come down, I expect them to be operating a reduced timetable next year. Hellenic Seaways has already cut back their highspeed and flying cat sailings for this year.

Sorry Jan, I wasn't ignoring your post, I missed the part about the fast ferries.

Seems the info about the ferries in general isn't available for some time, so just trying to get ideas. If we have to cut Folegandros, so be it.

I was not sure what you meant by 4-2-2. Did you mean 4 nights on Sifnos, 2 on Folegandros, and 2 on Santorini?

We want at least 4 on Santorini, but maybe you meant the reverse? 4 on Santorini, 2 on the other islands?

I was going by your original plan whereby you took Santorini first.

And I STILL think u should, because u can fly there immediately on arrival, ... and it leaves Athens for the last. I know u ask advice and then object to it, but listen, dear heart, I have done this 7 times and Heimdall has probably done it 30 times, and we're not just whistling dixie. It really does make sense. Reasons:

(1)why not get to an isle for your first night? u are still in "travel mode," the flight is less than 1 hr, and you can recover from any jetlag in a lovely serene place rather than bustly athens.

(2)It saves one back/forth trip to airport and your trip is so cruelly short you don't have time to waste in backtracking.

(3)if you leave Athens til last, it gives you a bit of "flex" in case there is a ferry glitch.

(4)you're new to Greece...and the Athens sights will resonate much more deeply once you've been immersed in the culture a little while.

but hey... what do we know?

Not quite that many times, but I have been going to Greece twice a year for a while, and just got back from my latest trip last week.

Wanderer1, we all have different travel styles, and I realize that you probably won't want to show up in Greece without hotel reservations. The point I was making is that except for Athens (and maybe Santorini) it is not necessary to plan very far in advance for a trip during May or June - you have plenty of time.

Travelerjan and I don't always agree, but in this case I concur completely with her advice.

Jan - and others

I absolutely will listen to your advice. That's why I posted.

Should we - given our short amount of time - cut out Folegandros? I have a sense it would make things easier, and give us a little more time to relax...

There is no reason to drop Folegandros unless you want to cut the number of destinations. I spent two nights there after Santorini last May, then went on to Antiparos. It's easy to do, you just have to wait until ferry timetables appear before refining your plans.

I don't see why you are trying to make all those decisions now for a trip that is nearly a year away. Relax - everything will work out fine.

Because budgeting for the trip, using frequent flyer miles, and our schedules at work necessitate planning this far ahead.

Wanderer i suggest you the following:

Buy the air tickets as soon as you want. Once you land in Greece, fly directly to Santorini. You can book Santorini accomodation right now if you want.

Apart from that GO WITH THE FLOW and leave everything else for next March. Don't worry about finding accomodation. The islands are almost "empty" in May except for Santorini and Mykonos.

In Folegandros i suggest you stay in Fata Morgana or Anemomylos.

I'm sure that with some flexibility you'll organise everything perfect even in April as long as you have your airtickets which is the most important thing.

About budgeting you can send emails to the hotels from now and you'll have an idea about prices.

Have fun planning!!