A trip to Greece was one of my family’s dream trips and we finally made it happen this year. It’s a place that does not have a direct flight from Seattle so it is a more difficult type of place to plan a trip from where we live especially if it’s a trip where time is limited. Our boys were in middle school when we took this trip and we had Seattle Schools Spring Break which typically lands in April. If you visit Greece in April your trip might also coincide with Orthodox Easter (ours did)-it’s always important to check for holidays in a city before you go-we did not check at first and ended up having to change parts of our trip around because we found out that many things are closed for Orthodox Easter in Greece. We picked Athens as our starting point for our 10 day trip to Greece just in case flights or ferries were delayed or cancelled. We also chose to spend our last night of the trip in Athens too.
Where to stay with teens in Athens: The Athenian Residences
If you followed along on my instagram, you’ll know that one of my sons planned a majority of this trip because I had a health issue. One of the most important things we needed when we booked hotels was if they were cancellable and for this reason we did most of our bookings through Expedia. My son and I consulted a lot together about various details of the trip and I ultimately had final say. But both of us were really excited to see what the Athenian Residences would be like in real life. We were also looking forward to staying in Athens for a few days. We both love big cities and this one has so much history.
Getting to the Athenian Residences from Athens International Airport
The Athenian Residences are in the Pysri neighborhood of Athens. There are many restaurants and shops even just right out the door from where we were staying. We could walk to the famous Little Kook and I was really tempted to eat here but it was not really something any of my guys were interested in. Another similar coffee shop nearby was Ellyz but I’ll have to come back here if I go to Athens with my sister or friends. Both of these places are very photogenic but my guys were determined to eat souvlaki every day of our trip. (They were the ones who insisted we did a hot chicken tour in Nashville and I swear this all started with the Taco Trail in Oxnard.). In Athens our favorite Souvlaki ended up being at a place we ate at on our last night.
Getting to and from the airport in Greece
When we first arrived in Athens we took the train from the airport to the Athenian Residences. We made sure to get a three day tourist pass that included return train transport to the airport and all other modes of public transit in the city for 72 hours. (When we got back to Athens from Crete later on in our trip we just took a taxi back and forth to the airport because we only had one night left so we didn’t get the three day tourist pass again) When we arrived off the train at the station near our hotel we saw the market square full of people and smelled fresh strawberries at the fruit vendors. We ended up buying oranges nearly everyday. There are oranges on the trees all over Athens but apparently those are only good for marmalade. The ones we bought from the fruit vendors were always sweet and delicious.
Our room at the Athenian Residences was quite spacious-it was spread out over two floors. This kind of room is perfect for a family with teenagers. With younger kids or grandparents I might avoid this place because there is a bit of a steep spiral staircase to get from the sleeping area in the bottom to the bathroom and sitting area upstairs. Especially for our first nights and for dealing with jet-lag, this was spacious and comfortable for our family of 4 and we would totally stay here again.
There was a little courtyard with a pool and sitting area and an olive tree. The pool was really chilly and it’s probably too cold still to swim in April but it was really cute. I think next time we’ll try to come back in May or June because our family loves being in the water.
And breakfast is included?
Our room rate included breakfast and many hotels in Greece seem to do this too (make sure you check your rate or call if this is important). We were asked if we had allergies or food preferences and what time we’d like breakfast to show up the next day. This was the first of our Greek hotel breakfasts and every breakfast on our trip ended up being pretty spectacular. The first day we had koulouri (a big round greek pastry kind of like a bagel) with different spreads, yogurts, juices and some kind of breakfast square. The next day we ordered breakfast a little later and we had wraps with feta, tomatoes and olives along with juice and yogurt again. The orange juice in Greece is often freshly squeezed and we really looked forward to it. (In some hotels they even had machines where we could make the juice ourselves)
Places to get to from the Athenian Residences
We were able to get everywhere we needed to from the Athenian Residences but we also ended up walking thousands and thousands of steps every day because we wanted to see everywhere. We walked to the Parthenon very early in the morning so that we could have it as empty as possible. You may be able to bundle tickets for the Parthenon and Agora and I think we could have booked that through our hotel to save money but we didn’t do that.
We found one of our favorite coffees of our whole trips as short walk away at Taf. Iced coffee is a little different in Greece than in the USA too. They froth the milk with sugar so that it forms a creamy cap on top.
There was also a large meat/vegetable/spices market not too far away called Varvakeios Agora. It was spectacular to visit. I had a bit of a hard time walking through the meat part but I also believe it’s really important to see where your food comes from.
One night we took the funicular-the Lycabettus Funicular (it was not as spectacular as the funicular we rode in Switzerland ages ago but still interesting to try.) to see some really beautiful views of the city. A friend told me later that we should have eaten at the restaurant there-her family really enjoyed their meal. If you do ride it, it doesn’t run exactly with the times it posts and it doesn’t hold a lot of people so you may have to wait a while.
We walked to Krinos Loukoumades which might be the oldest donut shop in Athens. We also found a really unique dessert shop called Zoubourlou.
And we ate so much Greek Salad and Souvlaki. On our last night we knew wanted to end our trip with souvlaki and Greek Salad. We ended up in the most perfect place right near a bustling street and a little peek of the Parthenon as the sun set. I don’t think any of us were ready to leave even after our 10 day trip.
(PS. we were also so tempted to come back to the Athenian Residences for our last night but we also like to try all the places we can. We ended up at the Fresh hotel which was a lovely place to stay in a nearby neighborhood with a fabulous breakfast too.)
Have you ever been to Athens? Do you have any favorite places in the city?
Terumi Pong is a Seattle-based family travel writer and mom of twin teenage boys. She loves coffee and pastries, shopping local and looking for greener ways to live. She is also known as Scout’s mom (Scout is a 5ish pound little black yorkie-poo)
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