Review of Aegean Airlines flight Souda → Athens in Economy

hello parthenon!

We went on holidays to the delightful greek island of Crete and on the way back, we purposingly booked a long lay over so that we could had time to visit a bit the beautiful city of Athens.
This was my first flight with the Star alliance member Aegean.
We booked our economy tickets through the greek airline itself and tracked the flights with the app on our mobiles. 

Soon after we booked our seats on the website.
 

Miles earned with this flight: 500

 I signed up for the miles + bonus loyalty shceme of Aegean Airline, as a (re)entry point to the Star Alliance, collecting my first miles in a long time…

 The app was fairly well designed and user friendly: you can see your itinary, know your seats and of course check in online and download your boarding pass.

at Chania International Airport

The hall was clean and spacious, and there was barely anyone at the checkin counter so we headed directly there. The gentleman was efficient and professional, the whole process lasted about 5 min.

We then through security, once passed there was barely any services/shops available and a very few seats for all the passengers. The room was a bit AC'ed but packed. The airport has the particularity not to have any jetways, rather the passengers are expected to walk down the stairs to either your plane or a bus that leads you to your plane; the second option was for us.

 All the announces for boarding were made mainly in greek, just a very short announce in english and boarding was very chaotic; not even a line dedicated to the business passengers.

The AvGEEK bit
Founded in 1987, Aegean was the first private greek airline. The airline mainly focused backed then on almost greek routes only and saw a rapid growth (30% per year) to the poinf where it became larger than the flag carrier, Olympic air. The Airline then started european destinations and was going to buy out bankrupted Olympic air when the EU commission prevented the transaction. Aegean then joined Star Alliance ain 2010 nd finally got approval to merge with Olympic air (which is now serving only on regional and domestic routes). Aegean serves European destinations only, and features 1 A319s, 37 A320s and 11 A321s.

Aircraft: Airbus A320-232
Registration: SX-DVU
Engines: 2x CFM56
Age: 10 Years
Layout: Y174
Observation: with Acropolis livery.

on board the a320

We went onboard with the bus and were welcome onboard by the purse.

 The seats were clean and confortable.

The crew seemed just about professional withouAfter push back we had the regular announce by the captain the safety procedures explained in the old fashion way by the crew.

We were taxiing for a short time up until the end of the runway, and took off directly after.

The plane made a slight right turn towards Athens, allowing us to take some fantastic pictures of Crete.

After take off and the seat belt switched off passed 10,000 feet, the crew quickly started their on board service and the screens above our heads was starting to display the route, the instant location, altitude and speed of the plane.

our heads was starting to display the route, the instant location, altitude and speed of the plane.

The magazine is very comprehensive

There were like 10 destinations covered: Paris

And Thessaloniki the second largest city, on the cover

The domestic network, that is really big but since Greece is mainly composed of islands..

And the pages for the geeks!

Athens International Airport Eleftherios Venizelos

The flight was very short and we started our short descent to Athens…

The landing was smooth and taxiing was short.

Athens airport has been hugely refurbished for the Greeks olympics and going to luggage reclaim then security was fast.

We left the airport using a taxi and planned to return after our quick visit to the city of Athena with the tramway. The airport is far away from the city centre.