How to Plan Your Best Greek Island Hopping Vacation

So you’ve decided to go to Greek island hopping for your next vacation; excellent choice. Greece is beautiful – the views, the food, the history, the beaches, the architecture. And if you hit the Google search on “Best Greek Islands to Visit” you will be overwhelmed with choices and opinions. Then, you might wonder how much time to spend on each island, how to get there, how to get around, the list keeps going! If you’re wondering any or all of the above, we’ve got you covered below. First things fist, let’s help you pick your top islands to visit.

Contents

What Are the Best Greek Islands to Visit?

Cycladic homes in Paros, Greece

The best Greek islands to visit varies depending on what you want to get out of your vacation. Some go for Santorini and Mykonos, others want to try more hidden gems. We did a bunch of research before choosing our islands, all of which we share in our blog post Best Greek Island for Your Next Mesmerizing Trip to Greece. We went for a mix of hidden gems and less-tourist islands such as: Milos, Paros, Naxos, and Zakynthos.

How Many Days Do I Need to Visit a Greek Island?

Depends. But from experience, 2 full days on the actual island (not including travel) is an aggressive but doable timeline. You won’t get to see it all but you’ll see most. Budget 3 days if you want more relaxing time (maybe at the beach) or to do more than one excursion/activity. Budget more or less depending on how you want to vacation, and ignore the judgmental comments saying “2 days is not enough!” or “What are you going to do for 5 days?!?”.

Some time-influencing things to keep in mind:

Ferries are notoriously late. And weather delays can be driven by high winds. We had 2.5 days budgeted for Paros that got cut short by a 10-hour ferry delay.
Time on the island v. time spent traveling to the island, especially if you’re Greek island hopping. Trust us, you don’t want to spend half your vacation on a ferry or a plane. Plan accordingly based on…
How close your islands are by car, plane, or ferry. And which one you take depends on where you’re going. To optimize your time on an island, I highly recommend picking islands in close proximity. Santorini, Mykonos, Naxos, and Paros are in the Cyclades, for example, but Greece contains 6 different groups of islands. Zakynthos and Corfu, for example, are Ionian islands to the northwest of Greece.

How to Greek Island Hop: Car, Plane, or Ferry

At this point we recommend getting a map of the Greek islands and figuring out where your top choices are relative to each other. Have more than you have time for so you can optimize your travel if need be.

Then you need to figure out how to get to each island. I used google flights and FerryHopper.com to find available routes. Here are some examples:

Mykonos: flight or ferry from Athens
Naxos: flight or ferry from Athens, 40 min ferry from Mykonos, 4 hour ferry from Crete, 1 hour ferry from Paros
Paros: flight or ferry from Athens
Milos: ferry from Athens, Mykonos, Crete, etc
Zakynthos: ferry or flight from Athens

What are My Transportation Options?

#1: The Car

You can take a personal car onto a ferry for an additional cost, but keep in mind rental cars are not allowed.

Once you do get to an island, a car is typically the easiest way to get around.

ATVs and scooters are also available if you’re comfortable. Otherwise, there are regular public buses, guided tours with shuttles, Airbnb hosts who will pick-up/drop-off from the airport or port, and of course, taxis. Note: no uber.

For more information on driving and rental cars on Greek islands, see below.

#2: Plane

If you’re visiting Athens on your trip to Greece, Athens is a great hub to take you to almost any island. To visit the Ionian islands, we recommend flying there. If going on a Cycladic island tour, you can easily start the tour by flying to the furthest island, such as Santorini. Pricing varies but are comparable; check google flights.

#3: Ferries

Seajets ferry departing Naxos, Greece

For everything you need to know about taking a ferry in Greece, check out our blog post.

Otherwise, the shortened version is, FerryHopper.com will take care of you. Easy and almost free cancellations, real-time tracking of your ship, but best of all it has all the routes and lets you book multi-stop trips. When booking a trip, it’ll give you options for faster or slower ferry routes at different prices. I recommend ferrying between islands in the Cyclades. You only need to be at the ferry 30 min to 1 hour before, unlike an airport. Plus, no extra fee for luggage and embarkment/disembarkment is very fast (though a bit chaotic). And on that note…

Once you figure out your possible ferry routes, you can start to flesh out a day by day itinerary.

Put Together Your Greek Island Hopping Itinerary

Sample Itinerary

Here’s an example of what to expect in terms of timing with ferries and rental cars:

Day 1: Ferry from Pireaus (Athens) to Milos 9:00 AM to 12:50 PM (on time!). Arrived at Airbnb in Klima ~15:00 after lunch and rental car pickup.
Day 2: Visit Milos
Day 3: Ferry to Paros (8:10 AM). Delayed until 14:00. Arrival in Paros ~17:30. Arrived at Airbnb in Parikia ~18:00 after rental car pickup.
Day 4: Visit Paros
Day 5: Ferry to Naxos 17:15, delayed to 18:45. Arrival in Naxos ~19:45, Airbnb nearby ~20:00 (no rental car).
Day 6: Visit Naxos.
Day 7: Visit Naxos, Ferry to Athens 13:40. Delayed until 14:15. Arrival in Athens around 18:00. Arrive at airport at 19:00. Flight to Zakynthos 20:20 with arrival at 21:20. Arrived at Airbnb (45 minutes away + rental car pick-up) at 21:00.
Day 8 and 9: Zakynthos
Day 10: Fly home (Zakynthos is an international airport and therefore we didn’t fly back to Athens).

Protip: Santorini is south of Paros and Mykonos north of Naxos. If you’d like to visit either of those islands, replace Milos with Santorini (might want to add a day on Santorini) and/or replace Naxos with Mykonos.

Key Itinerary Take-Aways

Ferry disembarkment is fast and be prepared to shuffle your schedule for delays.
Visiting the Cyclades and an Ionian island added almost 12 hours of additional travel time. For us, Zakynthos was worth it. If I had been smarter I may have planned on visiting Athens between the Cyclades and Ionian islands, and flying into the Cyclades instead of Athens.
2 days was enough for us to see each island and relax on some beaches. In retrospect, we could’ve used an additional ½ day in Paros.

For a recommended list of what to do on each island, see our other blog posts below:

Everything You Need to Know About Driving on Greek Islands

Car Rentals in Greece:

Book it in advance. By early/mid September all our rental agencies were sold out for the days we were renting.
Apply for and get a copy of the international driving license. Not everyone asks for it, but it doesn’t hurt to have.
Take pictures or a video of the car before driving off. Some agencies are strict about enforcing damages to the vehicle.
Most automobiles in Europe are manual shift. If you only drive automatic or aren’t comfortable with manual shift on tight steep streets, definitely book in advance (and be prepared to pay a bit more).
I didn’t find one rental agency that I could rent from throughout the islands. AVIS existed on some islands but was more expensive than local agencies. Check with your hotel/Airbnb host to see if they have recommendations.

ATV/Quad Rentals in Greece:

ATV rental in Naxos, Greece

We recommend doing it at least once for the experience!
We recommend renting an ATV or quad your smallest island or the island you plan on travelling the least. ATVs/quads are slower and more dangerous than cars. Personally, I would prefer a car for transporting luggage and easier climbing hills.
Book it in advance or you’ll be stuck with the smallest ATV that struggles to climb hills.
It’s cheaper than a car. Our ATV rental on Naxos with a day-of reservation was 45 euro/day + gas. Our rental cars were 70-100 euro/day plus gas.
There is a storage compartment, but it’s pretty small. It could maybe fit one medium-sized hiker’s bag.
You can fit two passengers on the vehicle. Helmets come with the rental.

Scooter Rentals in Greece:

Scooters were much more readily available, but I would still book in advance to get the right horse power.
Some places enforce the motor vehicle license requirement.
Scooters can be dangerous, be careful.
Pretty much all the same points as the ATV rental apply; the storage compartment is even smaller.

Collision insurance for all the above: check your credit card policy, especially if you have a travel specialty card.

Protip: Chase Sapphire Preferred/Reserve has a great collision insurance which means you can opt out of additional insurance through rental agencies.

General Tips for Greece and Greek Island Hopping

Air conditioning is not a given. Many buildings do not have it, so when booking lodging keep this in consideration. Many taxi drivers will also not turn on AC in 90F weather.
Carry cash (euro) on you as many vendors prefer it.
Uber isn’t really a thing. In Athens it links to the taxi company. On most islands it doesn’t exist.
Gas stations are not self-pump, someone pumps for you.
Many businesses are closed during the nap time, from 15-17 pm. Service is very “European” in that they sometimes take their time. You’re on vacation, sit down, relax, enjoy the food.
Ferries are usually late.
Roads can be narrow and down to one lane on the islands, no matter how steep the descent or climb. If you’re considering renting a car or driving, be prepared.
Greece is very hilly.

Found this post helpful? Subscribe to our blog or follow us on Instagram for our latest travel tips!

Instagram

How to Plan Your Best Greek Island Hopping Vacation