Hello.I arrive in Greece march 25, a greek holiday. Also, for my return trip I need to be at the ATH airport early for a flight that leaves at 6:50 am. I was wondering how easy or difficult it is to get a taxi at these times?. Would you suggest hiring a private transfer? I found one through the web and he charges 35 euro for a transfer from the plaka area to the airport?..Is this reasonable?..I have read in this site that taxis from the airport to the city center normally cost 20-25 euro. Is this correct?..Thank you in advance for your help.

For peace of mind, 35 euros for a car service seems reasonable. In Athens last year for a conference, we heard of prices between 15 and 40 euros being charged by taxis from the airport to the city centre. I think we paid about 20 going to the airport, so 35 sounds reasonable for a car service so early in the morning.

I paid 40 euros for a taxi to the airport last year from the Plaka area at 5:00 am.

However much it costs agree on a price before you leave Athens for the airport. I read various posts on here before my trip to Athens about taxi drivers ripping people off and vowed that it would not happen to me. It was the first thing that happened to me on arrival, I could have walked ten minutes to the hotel but I was taken round the square a couple of times unnecessarily and then overcharged. I really kicked myself for being taken in so easily.<BR>It didn't happen anywhere else.

For general info, a reliable taxi driver in Athens is Mario Kranidiotis (he's the father of a friend of mine. Konstantina, who speaks excellent English).<BR>His e-mail is <BR>[email protected]<BR>and he does competitive rates for journeys outside Athens. You can say you got the e-mail address from Michael.<BR><BR>35 Euro is about right as most of your journey will be before 5am which means double tariff. 20 euros is about right for daytime trips.<BR><BR>Incidentally, for most journeys in Athens, there are so many radio taxi services now that if you call one one you rarely have to wait more than 10 minutes. But for the airport, they are often reluctant to go there, because they have to wait in the queue so long to pick up their next fare.