Customer Reviews

Greek Island Hopping, 19th (Independent Travellers - Thomas Cook)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Everybody is always asking "is there a ferry to...?" And the answer is usually the same: if you can't stand on the dock itself and inquire, do the next best thing and read this unique, comprehensive book.

The book gives the schedule for every island and for the various mainland locations. You also get an overview of the various route patterns. This is especially valuable given the somewhat random nature of the schedule of Greek ferries. The route patterns and timings are key for planning a general strategy to serious island hopping.

Beyond this basic information, the annual guide offers wonderful gossipy reviews of individual boats, companies, and the changing picture of ferry travel from year to year. There are also little intros to the various islands. These island reviews are notable for detailed maps of the port cities showing where the boats land and the location of selected hotels. Note that: many islands have more than one location for the boats to dock. You could wind up a hundred yards or more away from where you need to be. With this guide you'll not be surprised.

Even ferry schedules published on site in Greece are notoriously "selective" in their accuracy, so how good can this book be? Obviously, I've not checked everything, but for the (very) few journeys I and my friends have taken, it has proved accurate.

So I would absolutely rely on this for planning a trip, but in no way rely on it day to day when I was in Greece. Go to the ferry agents or perhaps to the dock itself. Double check WITH THE SPECIFIC COMPANY YOU ARE USING, because what company A tells you about Company B is next to useless. Bear in mind that schedules do reduce in the off season.

Bottom line: this book is essential. I agree with Rough Guides when they term it "superb, user-friendly."

We visited the Greek islands for 10 weeks in June, July, and August. This book was hands down the best of the Greek Island books that we purchased (we also bought Lonely Planet and Frommers). We wanted to get out to some of the less visited islands, and this was the only book we found that included good details of places like Folegandros, Amorgos, Sikinos, and Serifos.

The book does not focus heavily on restaurants and accommodations as many other travel guides do. Instead, it focuses more on information about the islands and their history. We prefer that because we use trip advisor and other sites for our hotel and restaurant suggestions.

We also found the information to be more accurate in this book and more up to date than in the other books we used. The author uses a dry humor when describing some destinations, and that makes it a bit more interesting than just reading a bunch of facts. We also liked the side notes about historical information and other bits of interest about the various islands.

The books provides extensive information on the ferry system and connections. This is something that is hardly touched upon in other guides. However, we did not end using the ferry information in the book as much as we expected. It was helpful in getting a general sense of how certain connections work etc., but the schedules and variou island connections change so much each season that you are better off getting to Greece and then getting an up to date schedule.

I wish the book contained more information on helpful Greek phrases and Greek words. None of the books we purchased had more than 2 or 3 pages on the topic of the Greek language. In a book of several hundred pages it would be helpful to have about 10 pages devoted to common vocabulary words, phrases, numbers etc. to help with communication when in the more remote islands.

The current edition of book is essential if you are traveling independently between the islands. Other books are vague about the vital ferry details (the ferry schedules are Byzantine in the extreme). It also has good information about the islands themselves (e.g. Santorini) plus good detail maps and quite a bit of hotel information. It has a good section on Athens, too, as most island visitors have to start there.

Other guides may be as good about the islands' sights and hotels. But only this one will help to get you there in the first place.

I purchased this book as a gift for family members who were planning a 2-week cruise of the Greeks Isles. They reported that this book was a terrific source of information and helped them decide which sites to include during their short time ashore. There is detailed info on transportation of you plan on doing it yourself rather than hiring a car.

This book gives little more than a partial ferry schedule. Don't bother buying it.

This joyless book would be perfect for someone who has always wanted to go the Greek islands but didn't and is now dying of a terminal illness. That way they could read about how mediocre the entire experience would have been. The author of this book obviously had some life altering tragedy occur while on a Greek island (probably Santorini since that's the one he trashes most thoroughly). My guess is his wife left him for a some Greek hunk and he wrote this guide as a vengeful attempt at closure. This book is a downer--It's about as uplifting as hearing someone complain about their hemorrhoids. Of the 227 inhabitable Greek Islands, the author of this book could only find something redeemable to say about one, and even that was qualified by the fact that the place was very far from a hospital and that if you were to have an accident there you would need to be helicoptered out. It cited an incident a few years ago when this happened to a tourist, the helicopter crashed and everyone on board was killed.
The author's tone suggests that they are trying to be witty or realistic about the particular challenges that the Greek Island's present. Instead, it comes off as more of a "worst-case scenario survival guide", i.e. if for some reason you are forced to go there, here's how to make it back in one piece. It paints a picture of the Islands as a place where one will be swarmed by throngs of disgusting tourists, subjected to second rate food at exorbitant prices and confined to dingy hotel rooms run by degenerate petty thieves. Somehow we managed to have a great time on our trip in spite of this book. Don't let it deter you from enjoying the magic and beauty of the Greek Islands!