Spending 48 hours in Athens, Greece

Greece is a country that I’d not thought too much about, other than admiring the beautiful white buildings, blue roofs and dreamy views of many, many Santorini Instagram posts, and I’d never really looked into visiting Athens. When our friends invited us to their July wedding in Cyprus, I wanted to add a short city break on to the beginning of our summer holiday, to make it more like our usual trips. This trip was going to be different to our usual style, with a lot more time in a pool, having drinks with friends, eating out and of course the wedding itself, and it was a nice change, but I would have missed exploring had we not managed some city time too. When we realised it was cheaper to fly via Athens than direct to Paphos, we planned a couple of days exploring a new city in a new country for me, country number 35 of my 40 before 40. If you’re spending 48 hours in Athens (or even if you’re in the city for longer) I hope this post helps you out.

What do I need to know if I’m visiting Athens?

Greece, in July, is HOT. We knew it would be, we didn’t expect a heatwave, and at 35-38 degrees I struggled with the temperature in the city when we were walking around, but travelling with fibromyalgia means heat is always difficult for me. I wouldn’t recommend visiting in July if you can choose-obviously we wanted to fit in with the wedding.

Athens takes the euro and we barely used cash, so you should be fine to just carry 50 euros or so and then use a fee free card for the majority of your spending-I find it easier to keep track this way too.

I always travel with my Monzo card which is fee free abroad, and you can sign up to Monzo here. If you use my link, we each get a mystery reward of £10, £20 or £50 once you’ve completed a transaction. Alternatively if you’d prefer to use your normal bank account, consider Currensea, which links to your usual account. You use your Currensea card to pay with, it’s fee free, and it takes the money straight out of your normal account, no need to move funds, which my partner finds easier. You can sign up for a Currensea card here and if you use my link, once you’ve spent £100 abroad we each get £10. (I am only recommending accounts I use myself. Referral rewards are correct at the time of writing. If you choose to sign up with my link for either of these, thank you! You can of course sign up for these accounts without my referral link)

Getting into the city wasn’t easy for us-we paid 50 euros for a taxi from the airport via Uber, as we landed too late to get the metro into the city. Definitely budget for a pricy taxi if your flight is late in the evening as the last metro was 11:34pm and we had no chance of getting on it in time. We mostly walked across the city, getting the metro a couple of times-tickets are €1.20 for one journey within a 90 minute window, €4 for a 24 hour ticket, or you can buy a €20 3 day tourist ticket which includes the metro to and from the airport. A real bargain if you’re in time for the metro!

Leaving the city was also not straightforward. Getting to the airport on the metro was fine, dropping our bag at the airport was fine, security was fine, passport control to leave was a shitshow. The queue was so long, and we always arrive in plenty of time, that security called for people getting on our flight to come to the front of the queue, so that we didn’t miss the flight. It’s the only time I ever thought I wasn’t going to get my plane. I always get to an airport at least two hours before a flight (longer if I have a lounge booking or a bag to check in) but for Athens airport, definitely do more like three hours!

How much will I spend each day visiting Athens?

If you’re visiting Athens, you’ll want to make sure you have enough money, as some of the things are pricier than other cities we’ve been to. Spending 48 hours in Athens was a bit more expensive in terms of spending money than some of our previous trips, but we had some fancy coffees, a nice meal and did a few attractions/tours. We spent a total of £133.60 on food between us, £77.49 on transport including a pricy taxi from the airport, £132.48 on attractions/tours, and I bought £7.43 of souvenirs.

For the two full days we were in the city, we spent £171.78 each on shared costs (and add my £7.43 to that) meaning that, for us, Athens came in nicely under £200 each in spending money. Yes, you can absolutely do 48 hours in a different city and spend less, but we saw the Acropolis, did a cats of Athens tour via air b n b, went for a couple of instagram famous coffees, and had a nice meal on the first evening overlooking the Acropolis. I’m really happy with the amount we spent for the experiences we had.

How expensive are flights and accommodation when spending 48 hours in Athens?

We paid £286.97 for our flights out to Athens for two of us, including a 15kg hold bag. Obviously there’s no need to pay for a hold bag for a short trip, but we were going to a wedding in Cyprus afterwards. We then paid 150 euros, around £130, for our flight to Paphos, again including a hold bag. Flights home from Athens would have been more expensive, we’d added Athens on to our Paphos trip because it made the whole trip cheaper overall.

We paid £206.22 for four nights in an air b n b apartment, with cooking and washing facilities. We could have done this a bit cheaper, we chose to spend a little more on better quality accommodation, and could have knocked this down to about £150.

What should I do when spending 48 hours in Athens?

If you’re only spending 48 hours in Athens, you’ll need to be really choosy about what you see. The Acropolis is a must, but you’ll want to book in advance as it gets busy. We walked up the hill which was difficult in the heat, and we’d booked an 8am ticket expecting it to be quieter. It was not quite (perhaps because it was July!?) but it was worth the trek, and even though it was busy, it was beautiful. The views over the city were amazing too. The Acropolis is a UNESCO World Heritage site and you can see the Parthenon, Erechtheion, and Temple of Athena Nike as well as great views over the city. One of the prettiest things I’ve ever seen.

After the Acropolis, a walk through nearby Anafiotika, a neighbourhood that has a very Mykanos feel, is well worth your time. Google maps will take you through a very narrow, graffiti lined path-that’s correct, and I promise the neighbourhood is worth the little detour. Lots of cats, too.

If, like us, you enjoy meeting cats (and local people) there’s an Air b n b Cats of Thissio tour I can highly recommend. It takes a couple of hours and you’re taken around to meet, and feed, a few local cat colonies, it was a lovely break in our day. If you don’t fancy spending money on cats, consider heading to the Olympic Stadium, you can even run around the track if you’re fit enough/it’s not 40 degrees. We didn’t make it to the stadium due to time, but I know running around there would have been an amazing experience. If you do go to the stadium, you can also visit the Olympic Museum, on the same site.

After a busy morning, you’ll want to grab coffee. Coffee Island is an Athens chain we went to a few times and really liked, their coffee and food offering was tasty and reasonably priced. There’s 133 branches so you’re likely to spot them all over the city.

In the afternoon, if you’ve not done the cat tour or if you just fancy meeting more cats, there’s a cat cafe, Cat Cafe Athens, that I can recommend. We were there about an hour and the cats were very sweet. The food and drink was reasonably priced too, it’s a good cat cafe.

If you don’t fancy the cat cafe, there’s a very ridiculous cafe called Little Kook, that’s worth a visit if quirky is your vibe. It’s fairytale themed and changes regularly, so the photos I have are unlikely to be up to date, but they’ll give you an idea. We only stopped by for a photo so I can’t comment on the food quality, but the place is very Instagrammable…

End your afternoon with the beautiful Monastiraki Square, having a look at the ruins of Hadrians Library and going into some souvenir shops. The surrounding streets have really nice tavernas for an evening meal. Nearby Psirri neighbourhood is great for night life, so if you hang around until the bars have put tables out, you’ll find great places for a few drinks to end your day.

For your second day in the city, there’s so many more historical sites you may be interested in seeing. Due to the heat, we didn’t do too much more-we just wandered, taking in the sights of the city-but Temple of Olympian Zeus, Hadrian’s Arch, The Temple of Hephaestus, The Ancient Agora and Odeon of Herodes Atticus are all highly recommended to see. A lot of these are paid entry and we were really on a budget, which did play into our decision not to do all of them-I regret not seeing more now.

If you didn’t make it to the Olympic Stadium and Olympic Museum, doing these would be a great idea too.

End your last day by climbing (or getting the cable car) up Lycabettsus Hill, for gorgeous views over the city, and to watch the sunset. I swear by a gorgeous sunset view to end my time in a city.

Where should I go after visiting Athens?

We flew directly to Paphos, Cyprus for our friends’ wedding after Athens. There are absolutely loads of flights from Athens but at the time of writing this post (October 2025) some of the most exciting ones are to countries that aren’t easy to get to from the UK; Georgia, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Armenia are all direct and under £100.

Alternatively, Athens is a quick flight to the Greek islands with most of the flights being under £50 (Santorini, which I’m dying to go to, is just £13!)