{"id":6,"date":"2020-02-07T10:19:11","date_gmt":"2020-02-07T08:19:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/?p=6"},"modified":"2020-02-07T10:24:44","modified_gmt":"2020-02-07T08:24:44","slug":"athens-ioannina-in-5-hours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/2020\/02\/07\/athens-ioannina-in-5-hours\/","title":{"rendered":"\u0391\u03b8\u03ae\u03bd\u03b1 – \u0399\u03c9\u03ac\u03bd\u03bd\u03b7\u03bd\u03b1 \u03c3\u03b5 5 \u038f\u03c1\u03b5\u03c2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Sunny morning in Glyfada; the coastal district of Athens.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Thursday 6. February 2020<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Athens to Ioannina<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I’ve made it! After a journey which took just short of 22 hours I’ve made it to the city of Ioannina in North Western Greece.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I drove my own car to Greece last year but this holiday is the first time I’ve rented a car abroad (not counting Cyprus where they drive on the left) and driven in a car with the steering wheel on the wrong<\/em> side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After de-icing and de-misting the car before I drove away from the airport, the suburbs of Athens at 5 o’ clock in the morning were certainly an experience! At least traffic was light which meant it didn’t matter that I made a few mistakes – such as setting off on the wrong side of the road, before winding the window down as I tried to change gear on the motorway sliproad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the time the first 25km journey from the airport to my hotel was finished, I was relieved! I stopped overnight at the Palmyra Beach hotel<\/a>; one I stayed in last year when I drove here in my own car. I’ve only ever stayed here one night at a time before but it’s not a bad hotel so when I’m in Greece in the Summer and I have a few days to spare after Mum and Dad come home, I might stop for a few days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The car I’ve got for the next few days is a Mazda CX-3 – Diesel – small SUV. It’s quite big, but has a very powerful engine – Accellerating while joining the motorway I’ve already achieved the 130km\/h limit while still in 3rd or 4th with 2 more gears to go. Also…. It’s so quiet while I’m driving that when I looked down at the dashboard I was surprised to see I’d hit 150km\/h (93mph) for a brief moment, without realising… <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps I should get one of these cars when it’s time to replace my VW. This car would be great on the German Autobahn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Parked outside the Palmyra Beach Hotel – Glyfada, Athens. \/ \u03a4\u03bf \u03c0\u03ac\u03c1\u03ba\u03b9\u03b3\u03ba \u03b5\u03be\u03c9 \u03b1\u03c0\u03cc \u03c4\u03bf \u039e\u03b5\u03bd\u03bf\u03b4\u03bf\u03c7\u03b5\u03af\u03bf Palmyra Beach – \u0393\u03bb\u03c5\u03c6\u03ac\u03b4\u03b1 \u0391\u03b8\u03ae\u03bd\u03b1\u03c2.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

After breakfast and packing the car, I got on the road. It was overcast and as I made my way along the coastal road towards the motorway, the rain started coming down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I got stuck in an Athenian traffic jam where the A1 (Greece’s main North-South motorway) meets the A6 (Athens’ outer ring – a bit like the M25) but once clear of Athens I had miles of empty motorway all the way up to Ioannina which was nice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the first 45 minutes of the journy coming out of Athens until I got to Corinth, I had the radio on listening to Greek music. Greek FM radio reception isn’t great for long distance driving though so once I got outside the reception area for FM signals from Athens I plugged my phone in and alternated between country music, Radio 2 on the BBC Sounds app, and a Spotify playlist of Greek music. Driving for miles on empty Greek motorway, Tim McGraw’s song Two Lanes of Freedom<\/em> never felt so appropriate!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The “difficult bit” was driving out of Athens while still trying to get used to the car. I stopped at Corinth (Korinthos to call it by its local name) for a short rest and to enjoy the view over the Corinth Canal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Corinth Canal \/ \u0399\u03c3\u03b8\u03bc\u03cc\u03c2 \u03c4\u03b7\u03c2 \u039a\u03bf\u03c1\u03af\u03bd\u03b8\u03bf\u03c5<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The weather improved as the day went on and as I approached the half way point – the Rio-Antirrio bridge just outside Patra, the Sun came out and I had clear blue skies for the final 200km of the journey. The small village of Antirrio was my next stop, where I took a photo of the bridge I’d just driven over. (Top tip for anyone else doing a similar road trip: The bridge costs \u20ac13,50 or you can take the ferry for \u20ac6,50).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Rio – Antirrio Bridge \/ \u0393\u03ad\u03c6\u03c5\u03c1\u03b1 \u03a1\u03af\u03bf\u03c5 – \u0391\u03bd\u03c4\u03b9\u03c1\u03c1\u03af\u03bf\u03c5<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Antirio – \u0391\u03bd\u03c4\u03af\u03c1\u03c1\u03b9\u03bf<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Antirio – \u0391\u03bd\u03c4\u03af\u03c1\u03c1\u03b9\u03bf<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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My car – \u03a4\u03bf \u03b1\u03c5\u03c4\u03bf\u03ba\u03b9\u03bd\u03b7\u03c4\u03cc \u03bc\u03bf\u03c5<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The really weird thing about driving in Greece – as I found last Spring – was that when you stop at a motorway service station it isn’t unusual to be the only customer<\/em> there. At one service station I had the entire car park to myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps not a bad thing as I can’t park my rental car properly. It’s so big I can’t see the lines. But this is Greek and most of the locals ignore the lines too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shortly before 6 I hit the outskirts of Ioannina. By now driving with the steering wheel on the wrong side felt normal but it was the evening rush hour and my car is…. a bit wider than I’m used to. And I had to turn left across oncoming traffic to get to my hotel. And my hotel is down a narrow pedestrianised street on the edge of the Old Town – which I had to drive down to get to the underground garage. Perhaps an SUV isn’t the best vehicle for this city…..<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At least this time of day in Greece in February it is still daylight – the last of the evening Sun shining down on the city! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Within walking distance from my hotel is the Castle of Ioannina, and the lake not too far away too. Before dinner I had a walk around the city then ate at a taverna opposite the castle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It had been a long 2 days of travelling so an early night was needed!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Friday’s itinerary sees me spending the morning in the city before I head off to explore the Meteora, about a 90 minute drive away, during the afternoon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FH.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I drove my own car to Greece last year but this holiday is the first time I’ve rented a car abroad (not counting Cyprus where they drive on the left) and driven in a car with the steering wheel on the wrong side.… View Post<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2,5,4,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-athens-attica","category-corinth","category-ioannina","category-pelopponese"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6\/revisions\/18"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fred-hart.gr\/greece2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}