Originally Posted by
milehighwonder
Greetings! My wife and I will be arriving at ATH at 1am from LHR. I am considering options. We only have 3 days in Athens before getting on a cruise, so I am trying to balance resting from our trip over against going straight to our hotel at 3 am and then sleeping until who knows when and missing out on most of a good travel day. Plus, it seems like it's not really worth the cost to pay for a half night.
I was hoping to find an airport lounge we could hang out in for a few hours rest before catching the train when it starts at 630am. It would be great if I could find a lounge at ATH, and even better if I could use the same access to get into a lounge at LHR in either Terminal 3 or 5, as we will be at LHR for 8 hrs and transiting from terminal 3 to 5. I don't have any airline status to speak of, but I am definitly open to signing up for another card, or just paying for the access flat out.
Specificly Im wondering:
- Is it possible to go into a lounge after arriving at ATH from LHR, or would we have to be flying again for this to even be possible?
- Are there any lounges that could be used at LHR T3 or T5 AND at ATH?
- How much should it cost to catch a cab at 2am into the city, and would it be safe to do so? If we did that, any thoughts on what to do around 3am when we got there besides check into a hotel and sleep? At what time could we expect things in Athens to start opening up on a Friday?
- Any other ideas for a side trip at that time of night and how to get there? I'm thinking maybe we take a cab to a train station that is still running and catch a middle of the night train to be somewhere awesome by breakfast?
I don't see any issue with going from the Airport to the centre to get a hotel when arriving at 1am. I've arrived around 00:30 in ATH before and been in my hotel about 1 hour later. Baggage claim and passport/immigration are normally very quick at that time and the drive into the centre is also very quick as there is no traffic!
Given that shops, museums etc. don't open until 10 or 11 am then you will still get a pretty good nights sleep and it's better than a restless night trying to stay awake which will then probably ruin your whole next day.
I haven't stayed at the airport, but I have stayed at the Holiday Inn on Attica Avenue (the highway from the airport to the centre). A very average hotel but it is only a 10 min drive from the airport, although its in the middle of nowhere and only really good for the airport, nothing else!
I don't recall any sort of lounges for arriving passengers, and this link;
https://www.aia.gr/traveler/airport-...unges/lounges/
Confirms this and a google shows that nothing will be open during the night, as they all close between 22:00 and 01:00