This is our 4-day itinerary for a City-break in Athens with teens and tweens. It offers a mix of key historical sights, yummy food tasting and some beach time.
About this itinerary for teens and tweens
About this Athens itinerary for teens and tweens
You could easily spend a week or 2 exploring Athens on your own or with a partner and not get bored. However, if, like me, you are also travelling with tweens, packing the “must see and dos for families” into a shorter itinerary might be more appealing. Its also more budget friendly!
I have aimed this itinerary at independent travellers with tweens or teens. It would also suit couples or singles. I would not however recommend it for families with very young children. To be honest, I wouldn’t recommend Athens at all as a destination for families with children under 5. Athens is hot, hilly, busy, and loud, and I think the history would be lost on younger children.
Overview of your 4-Day Athens Itinerary for teens and tweens
Day 1: Athens – Acropolis / Parthenon and the Ancient Agora
Day 2: Athens Foodie Tour and the Acropolis Museum
Day 3: Day trip to Aegina Island
Day 4: Day trip to Mycenae, Nafplio and the Theatre of Epidaurus
Getting around Athens with teens and tweens
Athens was different in many ways to what I had imagined. I had thought, though I’m not really sure why, that the streets would feel edgy after dark and that we would retreat to our Airbnb each evening. In fact, the centre of Athens felt very safe and clean. We happily walked out each evening with our boys to eat in a different restaurant. We would return to the apartment around 10pm with no concerns.
The taxi ride from the airport to our Airbnb apartment (to find out more about where we stayed, click here) was enough to confirm my suspicion that driving in Greece would be terrifying. My poor husband, sat in the front of the taxi, told me afterwards that the taxi driver spent the first 200 metres checking his phone with no hands on the wheel. Even from the back seat, the beeping and screeching of brakes was enough to tell me that our driver was undertaking some dubious overtaking manoeuvres!
As such, this itinerary does not require you to rent a car. Instead, I recommend a mix of walking, public transport, and guided tours. You could rent a car for the day to do a DIY trip to Mycenae and Nafplio. This would allow you to explore these sites at your own pace and in your own time). However, for me, our guides added a lot of context that we would have lacked otherwise.
Day 1 Athens Itinerary for teens and tweens – The Acropolis and Parthenon followed by the Ancient Agora
9am Start early in the day with a visit to the Acropolis.
1pm Lunch and rest
3pm (or later) Visit to the Ancient Agora
The Acropolis and Parthenon
For my Greek-mythology mad tween, exploring the Acropolis and Parthenon were his “must do”. We booked the Athens Highlights Mythology tour with Alternative Athens.
“Acropolis” roughly translates as “highest point”. Whilst the term is usually associated with the Acropolis of Athens, there would have been an acropolis in every Greek city. Acropolises (not sure if that’s the correct plural!) were used as forts, places of worship and residences for those of higher status.
However, the hike up to the top of the Acropolis passes many other fascinating sights such as the Theatre of Dionysus. Built in 6 BC, the Theatre of Dionysus is one of the oldest in the world. The amphitheatre is well preserved. You can still see the names of nobles carved into the stone seats of the front row. Dionysus was the God of wine and having a good time, my kind of god!
As you head further up the Acropolis Hill, you can look down into the Odeon of Herodes Atticus. A wealthy Athenian constructed this theatre in 161 AD in memory of his wife. During the summer Athens festival, you can attend concerts and operas in this 500 seat theatre. There are also killer views across Athens and out to the Aegean Sea as you climb higher.
Finally, you will join the crowds shuffling through the ancient entry gate (Propylaea) at the flat summit which leads through to the Parthenon, the Temple of Athena Nike and the Erechtheion (also known as the Temple of Athena Polias).
The Parthenon
The most well-known sight and biggest draw on the Acropolis is the Parthenon. Dedicated to Athena, the Goddess of war and the namesake of the city, the temple, completed in 438 BC, is one of the oldest standing temples on earth. A frieze of the gods ran around the top of the temple. You can see parts of this frieze in the Acropolis Museum.
Be prepared that much of the Parthenon is currently a building site as restoration works continue. If you walk right around the Parthenon, you will see blocks of stone and parts of ancient columns piled up and ready to be put back in position.
There are, inevitably, crowds through the entry gates at the summit and close to the Parthenon. However, you can easily find a quiet spot to sit on a rock and take in the Parthenon (and the other sights) from slightly further away. Teens will also enjoy taking some selfies with the Parthenon in the background!
Lunch
For an easy and close lunch, you could try the restaurant on the second floor of the Acropolis Museum. You can book a table in advance by emailing restaurant@theacropolismuseum.gr (in English is fine). You can eat on the terrace under an umbrella. The inside is air-conditioned so nice and cool but do ask for a table by the large picture windows.
The Museum does also have a café on the ground floor. However, the views of the Acropolis from the restaurant are stunning.
The food is good in the restaurant and the service was very friendly. On the downside, this was our most expensive meal in Athens (although still very reasonable compared with London prices).
Alternatively, you could wander into the narrow, atmospheric streets of Plaka or the bustling area around Monastiraki Square. In either area, you can take your pick from the many small restaurants and cafes dotting the streets and steps.
The Ancient Agora
Here I am talking about the ancient Greek Agora. Don’t confuse it with the Roman one down the road. The Romans pinched the best bits from the Greek one and built their own in around 27-17 BC).
Save for the Temple of Hephaistos (built circa 460-415 BC), the site is mainly ruins. Historically, the Agora was the political and social centre of Athens and a key meeting place. Everyone from philosophers to politicians, priests to prostitutes would have crossed paths here.
Excavations only started in 1931 (led by the American School of Classical Studies) and are still ongoing. In a great juxtaposition of old and new, a metro line runs across the entrance to the site above ground. The metro line was built before the discovery of the ruins. Personally, I think the heavily graffitied trains give a good reminder that this historic site is in the beating heart of a lively modern city.
If your teens or tweens are getting a bit historied-out, get them to search out the many friendly tortoises. You can often spot these on the lawn near the Temple of Hephaistos.
A museum on site, included with the entrance ticket, houses many of the artefacts and art work excavated on site. We didn’t get to this however so I can’t offer any view on whether it is worth visiting.
Tips for visiting the Acropolis and the Ancient Agora with teens and tweens
If you want to avoid the heat of the day on top of the Acropolis (and I would strongly suggest that you do!), this day needs to start early – even if this means grumpy teenagers!
Be aware that, apart from water, you are not allowed to eat or drink within the Acropolis site. To avoid flagging children (and husbands), you might want to feed them a quick snack just before you go in. If not, pack a snack in your bag for when you leave). We discovered this the hard way. As I started unwrapping a Soreen bar on a rock next to the Parthenon, our guide (very nicely) informed us that we shouldn’t eat or drink. Although she did suggest I still fed it to the kids discretely!
In both sites, there are water fountains to refill your drinking bottles. On the Acropolis, you will find the fountain near the toilets (just beyond the Parthenon). At the Agora, the fountain is just on your left as you go in.
It is perfectly possible to visit the Acropolis and Parthenon on your own. However, as my knowledge of Greek history is limited, we decided to book onto a guided tour. We booked our tour of the Acropolis and Agora with Alternative Athens.
Tickets for the key archaeological attractions
You can purchase a 5-day ticket which covers entrance to 7 key archaeological sites. If you book a guided tour, the tickets may be included in the price. The tickets covers the Acropolis and the Ancient Agora. It also gives access to the Temple of Zeus, Roman Agora, Hadrian’s Library, Keramikos Cemetery and Lyceum of Aristotle. In April 2024, prices were 30 Euros per person. However,there does not appear to be a reduced price combi-ticket for teens or tweens. As such, if you are not going to visit all 7 sites, you may prefer to pay for entrance tickets separately. if you do this, you can then usually get half-price for your teens and tweens. Although the ticket is valid for 5 days, please be aware that you can only enter each attraction once.
Day 2 Athens Itinerary for teens and tweens – Foodie tour of Athens and the Acropolis Museum
Athens Foodie Tour
As a family, we love to eat and to try new foods so a foodie tour of a new city is always a great experience for us.
Our foodie tour kicked off at 9.30am so I was a little disappointed that a wake-up cup of Greek coffee, served the traditional way, wasn’t the first pitstop on our tour. We had consumed several types of pie and a koulouri – a sesame-covered bagel type bread – before we even got a sniff of caffeine…. Despite this, we all really enjoyed this tour, which finished with a mezze style lunch at around 2pm and my oldest boy said this tour was the highlight of his trip.
Several companies offer various foodie tours around Athens, and all seem to have decent reviews. We booked our tour with Athens Food on Foot and i would highly recommend them.
You could go straight from lunch to the Acropolis Museum. However, we were all stuffed and sleepy and in need of some downtime so headed back to our Airbnb for a cup of tea and some episodes of the Smurfs on Netflix!
The Acropolis Museum
After a few hours chilling out, we headed down to the Acropolis Museum just after 4pm. The Museum is open until at least 8pm each day (except Monday when it closes earlier) in the summer season (from 1 April to 31 October) and it is much quieter to visit later in the afternoon.
Your museum ticket includes access to the archaeological excavation below the Museum and this was probably the highlight of the visit for us. We were all a little sceptical however of the concrete paths and pillar supports for the museum which seemed to have been randomly imposed on the ruins.
If I’m honest, whilst the exhibits in the main museum are attractively presented and undoubtedly impressive, there are only so many broken pots and headless statues that kids (and their parents!) can get excited about. Probably not something you should really say but still true, for us at least!
Also, if you are English like us, you may start to feel slightly uncomfortable by the extent to which Elgin’s “theft” of the Marbles is rammed down your throat. Don’t get me wrong, I think we should give them back now but the narrative does still feel too negative.
The boys enjoyed the Lego reconstruction of the Acropolis. We had fun spotting the “extras” added by the creator, such as Elton John playing the piano and Gandalf from Lord of the Rings arriving at the Acropolis. Unsurprisingly, eagle eyes can also spot Lord Elgin stealing the Marbles! They also spent some time playing games about myths and Ancient Greece on the computers in the kids corner.
Day 3 Athens Itinerary for teens and tweens – Day Trip to Aegina Island
After a few hot days with lots of walking in Athens, my boys were desperate to plunge into the Aegean! There are a few small beaches around Piraeus. However, we were all keen to experience a bit of Greek island life as well as the mainland so for day 3 of our Athens Itinerary with teens and tweens we decided to head out on a day trip to Aegina.
We did consider Hydra as an alternative to Aegina but plumped for Aegina, largely because it is closer and none of us wanted another super-early morning!
How to get to Aegina Island
We travelled to Aegina by taking the metro to Piraeus Port and then a ferry. Please click here for more detailed information on the journey.
The total journey time was around 2 hours each way (plus some additional waiting time on the way out as we arrived too early at the port).
We arrived on Aegina just after 12.30pm and left on the 17.45 return ferry.
Things to do on Aegina Island with teens and tweens
You will need to decide whether to base your trip in Aegina Town (where the ferry docks) or whether you want to use taxis or buses to explore the sights and beaches beyond the town.
As we only had around 5 hours on the island, we decided to stick with Aegina Town itself. We didn’t really want to incur the cost of taxis. Also, I was worried that we might struggle to find taxis to take us back to the port at the end of the day if we strayed too far from the main town. I had read that buses were infrequent and often delayed and I didn’t want to waste our time on the island travelling.
Our afternoon therefore consisted of lunch, a swim in the Aegean, an ice-cream pick-me-up and a wander through the streets of the old town.
Lunch
As soon as you get off the ferry, you will see the various restaurants and cafes lining the harbour. We wanted to eat beachside for lunch though so turned left out of the port instead and headed to one of a small handful of restaurant terraces next to the beach.
We ate at Maistrali Restaurant. I would say the food was ok rather than amazing, but it was a lovely spot! There are lots of stray cats in Athens and Aegina. I understand that this is a hangover of the financial crisis when lots of cat sanctuaries closed down. A Greek friend told me that the locals all feed and look after these stray cats, so they actually have quite a nice life! Unfortunately, while we were eating our lunch, a stray cat started wandering through the outdoor tables looking for a nice spot to finish digesting the dead bird it was carrying in its mouth (to the horror of my vegetarian older son). In true Fawlty Towers style, several waiters, and an older lady who appeared to be an owner, then proceeded to chase this cat unsuccessfully through the tables flapping tea towels at it….
Beach time
As soon as they had eaten, the kids were desperate to get on to the sand and into the sea. The closest stretch of beach to the port didn’t look particularly exciting and was quite busy. Instead, we pressed on round the headland beyond the lone remaining column of the Temple of Apollo to a further beach. The beach itself was just ok. The sand was a little gritty / pebbly and some plastic waste had been washed up by a storm the previous day. However, the draw for the boys was the sea itself. They immediately removed socks and shoes and charged in, soon to be followed by tops so they could go for a full-on swim in their shorts.
We were there in mid-April and I think the sea temperature was only around 17-18 degrees. For me, this was definitely too cold to swim, but my boys weren’t the only ones in there. A group of
Greek teenagers spent quite a while trying to form a human pyramid in the water for a photo, whilst some older adults were out for a bracing swim.
One really nice thing was that the sea was shallow for quite a long way out so the boys could swim and run about in the water for quite a distance but still stand up and only have the water just above their waists.
After a happy half hour or so, both boys were cold and sat shivering on the rocks in their wet shorts. Note, they both refused to change into dry shorts behind the small towel I had brought, thinking I would only be drying feet!). Once they were in the sun, they soon warmed up but we all decided a drink and ice-cream would be the way forwards. We headed back into town and ordered some stupidly large waffles with pistachio puree and pistachio ice cream (did I mention that Aegina is famous for its pistachios!) at one of the cafes by the harbour.
Aegina Old Town
Feeling slightly sick and with just under an hour until our return ferry, we decided to explore the narrow streets leading back from the port. There we saw some amazing looking small restaurants and cafes. Whilst it had been nice to eat with a sea view, I do think that we would have had a better meal at one of these and I would definitely venture off the harbour / beach front to eat if I ever went back to Aegina.
We finished our walk by sticking our heads into the beautiful church at the far end of the harbour (a service was about to start so we didn’t go in) and admiring the usual Greek Orthodox fare of huge chandeliers, elaborately decorated Iconostasis and lots of incense burning! We then made our way back to the port and got our ferry back to the mainland.
Day 4 Athens Itinerary for teens and tweens – Mycenae, Nafpilo and the Theatre of Epidaurus
Day 4 is a bit of a toss up between exploring more of the sights of Athens and venturing further afield. Other than heading out of the islands, guided trips focus either on Delphi or some of the key sights in the Peloponnese.
We did look at Ancient Delphi but didn’t want to travel 4 hours each way in one day. As such, we booked in for a full-day minibus guided tour of Mycenae, Nafpilo and the Theatre of Epidaurus with Getaways Greece (booked through Get My Guide).
This was an early start. Whilst our tour advertised pick-up from your hotel / apartment, we were notified the day before that our street was too narrow / steep for the minibus and that we would need to meet them at a designated spot, around 10 minutes’ walk from our Airbnb. We were one of the last pick=ups but still had to be at our spot by 8.25am! i did find it a long day (we got back at 7.30pm) but definitely worth it.
Our tour was in English and was for a maximum of 12 people. In the end, we shared our trip with lovely families from Sri Lanka and LA and a lady from Serbia (who seemed generally unimpressed with the whole thing!).
Mycenae
After a quick loo stop and photo opportunity at the Corinth Canal, We reached our first main stop, Mycenae.
Don’t underestimate the ancient town of Mycenae – it gave its name to an entire civilisation! This was the Mycenaean kingdom led by the legendary King Agamemnon, he of Trojan Wars fame.
Before exploring the former centre, we stopped off at a well-preserved tomb, which may (or may not) actually be the vaulted tomb of Agamemnon.
After a quick romp through the onsite archaeological museum, you walk up through the Lion Gate (the entrance to the ancient fortified town with two lionesses above). Beyond the Lion Gate, it is more ruin but there are stunning views of the surrounding countryside as you climb up through.
You will see the grave circle., which is almost 30 metres across with 6 shafts going down to the graves. Many of the treasures now housed in the archaeological museum were excavated here. You’ll then past ruins which show the foundations of the homes and other buildings that made up the bulk of the town before reaching the Palace of Mycenae. Although the Palace is now ruined, you can make out its layout. Information boards should help you spot the main courtyard, throne room and grand staircase.
Nafplio
Our lunch stop was in the beautiful seaside town of Nafplio. A small town now, Nafplio was the first capital of the newly founded Greek state (between 1823 and 1834).
After a walk along the waterfront and through the streets of the old town, we were ready for kebabs Greek style!
Other than eating lunch, we just spent an hour or so strolling around the town. We were quite tired and hot by this point and ready to get back on the air-conditioned minibus and relax a little!
The Theatre of Epidaurus
The theatre is on the UNESCO World Heritage List due to its exceptional architecture and aesthetics (apparently a coin dropped at the centre can be heard from the highest rows). Constructed in the late 4th century BC, it is still hosts performances, including an annual summer festival.
We were encouraged to stand on the central stone and start clapping our hands as we walked to the outside of the centre circle and up on the first row of seats so we could hear the acoustics change. We did also try having one person clapping on the central stone with the others at the very top listening but I’m not really sure whose noise we could hear! The boys enjoyed going up and down the stairs but we were warned by our guide that they would be whistled at by a security guard if they tried to run (given how steep the theatre was, this is probably a sensible safety measure!).
The theatre shares a site with a sanctuary dedicated to Asclepius, the ancient Greek God of medicine. Many of the offerings, statues, and parts of the decoration from the sanctuary can be viewed in the small museum on site (although some of the items in the museum are replicas rather than originals!)
That’s the end of our 4 day Athens Itinerary for teens and tweens – we hope you enjoy the City as much as we did!
