Marble on a rock above a concrete sprawl — the Parthenon, a museum built to answer it, and tavernas in Plaka that outlast every empire
✈ International🛂 Visa — Schengen Required💱 €
€2,038
Est. total budget
5
Days
10
Attractions
13
Meals planned
💡 Recommended trip length for Athens: 5 days — the Acropolis and its museum, the Agora and Plaka, the National Archaeological Museum, a sunset at Cape Sounion and a day left over for the islands or the hills.
🗓 Prices & visa rules verified: August 2026
1
Arrival Day
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2
Day 2 — a free sample of your itinerary
Your unlocked preview day
🍯
08:00
🍯Breakfast
Greek yoghurt with thyme honey, and a freddo espresso.
€5.45 /person (est.)
🏘
09:10
🏘Plaka, Monastiraki & Anafiotika· Plaka
🕒 Open all day · Free to wander. Anafiotika is residential and signposted badly on purpose — climb the stepped lanes above Mnisikleous street and you will find it. Monastiraki's Sunday flea market is the real one; the rest of the week it is mostly souvenirs.
Free⏱ 3 hoursculture
Plaka, Monastiraki → Acropolis
🚶~10 min on foot · Monastiraki (Green/Blue) → Akropoli (Red line)
🏛
12:15
🏛Acropolis & the Parthenon· Acropolis
🕒 08:00–20:00 · Last entry 17:00 · €30 April–October, €15 from 1 November to 31 March. Go at 08:00 or after 17:00 — the middle of a July day on that rock is genuinely dangerous, there is no shade and the marble reflects the heat. Timed entry slots are now enforced; book online. Under-18s of any nationality enter free.
€30.00⏱ 3 hoursculture
🥙
15:15
🥙Lunch
Souvlaki in paper, or a shared plate of mezedes.
€13.62 /person (est.)
Acropolis → Acropolis Museum
🚶~5 min on foot · Akropoli (Red line) → Akropoli (Red line)
🗿
16:20
🗿Acropolis Museum· Makriyanni
🕒 09:00–20:00 · Last entry 17:30 · Do this AFTER the Acropolis, not before — the museum is the explanation and the rock is the thing. The top-floor gallery shows the frieze with gaps where the Elgin marbles should be, deliberately. The café terrace has the best cheap Parthenon view in the city.
€20.00⏱ 2.5 hoursculture
🐙
19:05
🐙Dinner
Grilled octopus and horiatiki at a Plaka taverna.
€23.61 /person (est.)
3
Day 3
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4
Day 4
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5
Departure Day
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🔒 You're viewing 1 of 5 days. Unlock to open the other 4 fully-planned days.
✈️Flights€799.13
Per person · return from India€399.56
Total · 2 adults€799.13
🏨Accommodation€290.59
3-Star hotel · per night (per room)€72.65
4 nights × 1 room€290.59
🎭Attractions & Activities€330.00
Acropolis & the Parthenon€60.00
Acropolis Museum€40.00
Cape Sounion & the Temple of Poseidon€40.00
Ancient Agora of Athens€40.00
National Archaeological Museum€40.00
Panathenaic Stadium€24.00
Temple of Olympian Zeus & Hadrian's Arch€40.00
Roman Agora & Hadrian's Library€20.00
Lycabettus Hill Funicular€26.00
Total (all pax)€330.00
🍽️Food & Dining€368.69
🌅 Breakfast × 4d × 2 pax€43.59
☀ Lunch × 5d × 2 pax€136.22
🌙 Dinner × 4d × 2 pax€188.88
Total food & dining€368.69
🚇Local Transport€70.00
Per person · per day (public transit)€7.00
5 days × 2 pax€70.00
🛂Visa — Schengen Required€180.00
Entry typeSchengen short-stay visa (Greece)
Fee€90 per applicant (€45 age 6–12, free under 6)
ProcessApply via VFS Global for Greece + biometrics
ProcessingAbout 15 working days — apply 6–8 weeks ahead
ValidityUp to 90 days in any 180-day period (Schengen-wide)
TipGreece is a heavily-applied-for destination from India and summer slots go months ahead. Apply to the country where you will spend the most nights.
Estimated Grand Total
Athens · 5 days · 2 adults
€2,038
Estimate · 2 adults, 3-star. Your dates, group & final plan set inside the full itinerary.
In your Itinerary
10 attractions
✓ All 10 attractions with descriptions, opening hours & ticket prices. Your personalised day-by-day plan unlocks with the full itinerary.
✓ Day 2
01 / 10
🏛 Acropolis & the Parthenon
Acropolis
culture
3 hours
🕒 08:00–20:00
The rock that the whole idea of the West is filed under — the Parthenon, the Erechtheion with its six stone women holding up a porch, and a marble path polished glassy by two and a half thousand years of feet.
✓ Day 2
02 / 10
🗿 Acropolis Museum
Makriyanni
culture
2.5 hours
🕒 09:00–20:00
Built over an excavated Athenian neighbourhood you walk above on glass, and topped by a glass gallery aligned exactly with the Parthenon so the surviving frieze hangs in the light it was carved for.
✓ Day 2
03 / 10
🏘 Plaka, Monastiraki & Anafiotika
Plaka
culture
3 hours
The old town under the north slope — neoclassical houses, a flea market that spills across Monastiraki square, and above it Anafiotika, a pocket of whitewashed Cycladic cottages built by island masons who got homesick.
04 / 10
🌅 Cape Sounion & the Temple of Poseidon
Sounion
culture
5 hours
🕒 09:30–20:00
Doric columns on a headland seventy kilometres down the coast, dropped straight into the Aegean — the temple sailors saw first coming home, and still the best sunset in Attica.
05 / 10
⚱ Ancient Agora of Athens
Monastiraki
culture
2 hours
🕒 08:00–20:00
Where Athens actually happened — the market and civic centre Socrates argued in, with the best-preserved Doric temple anywhere standing on the hill above it and a reconstructed stoa holding the site museum.
06 / 10
🏺 National Archaeological Museum
Exarchia
culture
2.5 hours
🕒 08:00–20:00
The largest collection of Greek antiquities on earth — the gold Mask of Agamemnon, the bronze Artemision Zeus mid-throw, and the Antikythera mechanism, a corroded geared computer two thousand years ahead of itself.
07 / 10
🏟 Panathenaic Stadium
Pangrati
culture
1 hour
🕒 08:00–19:00
The only stadium in the world built entirely of marble — a Roman arena re-cut in 1896 to host the first modern Olympics, still the finish line of the Athens marathon.
08 / 10
🏛 Temple of Olympian Zeus & Hadrian's Arch
Athens Centre
culture
1 hour
🕒 08:00–20:00
Fifteen Corinthian columns still standing out of a hundred and four, on a temple that took seven centuries to finish and barely a lifetime to be looted — with Hadrian's arch at the edge marking where his new city began.
09 / 10
🕰 Roman Agora & Hadrian's Library
Plaka
culture
1.5 hours
🕒 08:00–20:00
Athens after the Romans arrived — a second marketplace, and the Tower of the Winds, an octagonal marble clock tower with a water clock inside and a carved wind god on each face.
10 / 10
🚟 Lycabettus Hill Funicular
Kolonaki
leisure
1.5 hours
🕒 09:00–23:59
A tunnelled funicular up the steepest hill in Athens to a whitewashed chapel on the summit, with the Acropolis floodlit below and the Saronic Gulf beyond it.
✓ All 3 stops on your Day 2 route. Unlock to see all 10 attractions mapped across your full itinerary.
✓ All 10 tips — visa, airport transfer & ways to spend less.
🛬
Airport → your hotel
Athens International (ATH) is about 33 km east of the centre. Metro line 3 goes straight from the terminal to Syntagma and Monastiraki in roughly 40 minutes for a flat €9 one-way airport fare (a normal €1.20 city ticket is NOT valid to the airport). The X95 express bus to Syntagma is €5.50 and runs 24 hours, which matters because the metro does not. Athens taxis run a regulated flat fare to the centre — about €40 by day and €55 between midnight and 05:00 — so with two or more people and luggage the taxi is competitive with the metro. Verified Aug 2026.
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Ways to spend less
There is no longer a government multi-site combination ticket — Greece discontinued it in April 2025. Third-party "combo passes" at €79–98 are commercial bundles, not the old state pass, and they are rarely cheaper than buying the two or three sites you will actually visit.
The Acropolis drops from €30 to €15 between 1 November and 31 March, and so do most state sites. A winter Athens trip costs roughly half in tickets.
Under-18s of any nationality enter every state archaeological site free — Acropolis, Agora, Sounion, Olympian Zeus. Carry passports as proof.
State sites and museums are free on the first Sunday of the month from November to March, plus 6 March, 18 April, 18 May and 28 October.
A 24-hour city transport ticket is €4.10 and covers metro, bus, trolley and tram — but NOT the airport line, which is a separate €9 fare in each direction.
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Emergencies
112 — the single EU emergency line, English-speaking, free and 24/7. Tap water in Athens is safe and good; on the islands it often is not.
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SIM & data
Cosmote, Vodafone and Nova sell prepaid SIMs at the airport and in any kiosk. eSIMs work fine and are usually cheaper. EU roaming plans cover Greece.
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Best time to visit
April–early June and mid-September–October are the sweet spots: warm, long days and bearable stone. July and August routinely pass 38°C and the Acropolis has no shade at all — if you must come then, do the rock at 08:00 and museums in the afternoon. Winter is mild, half-price and often bright.
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Getting around
The metro is clean, cheap and reaches almost everything you want — €1.20 for 90 minutes, €4.10 for 24 hours. The airport is a separate €9 fare. Central Athens is walkable and the archaeological promenade links most of the big sites without a road crossing. Validate your ticket; inspectors do check and the fine is steep.
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Visa for Indians
Indian passport holders need a Schengen short-stay visa. Apply through VFS Global for Greece with biometrics; fee €90 (€45 for ages 6–12), processing about 15 working days, plus roughly ₹2,500 in VFS service charges. Budget ₹15,000–16,000 per adult all-in with insurance.
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Food to try
Souvlaki and gyros from a proper psistaria, grilled octopus, horiatiki salad with a slab of feta, moussaka, and loukoumades drowned in honey. Vegetarians do well here — Greek cooking has a whole category of meat-free dishes (ladera) that exists because of Orthodox fasting.
☀
The heat is a planning constraint
This is the one thing people underestimate. An Athens July afternoon on unshaded marble is not a discomfort, it is a health risk — the Acropolis has closed at midday during heatwaves in recent summers. Carry water, start at opening time, and put the National Archaeological Museum or the Acropolis Museum in the 13:00–17:00 slot.
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Pickpockets on the metro
Organised and persistent on line 3 from the airport, around Monastiraki and on crowded platforms. Bag in front, nothing in back pockets. Violent crime against tourists is rare — this is a pocket problem. Omonia at night is best avoided.