08 Oct 2019
We visited Syros, Mykonos and Santorini. Trying to get from the port to our hotel on Mykonos was a nightmare as there are a small number of buses and taxis, and a large number of tourists. We discovered on the island that hotels have shuttles that they can send to pick up passengers, but this wasn't included in our trip which meant trying to get to our hotel was unnecessarily stressful. I'd rather the cost of a shuttle was added so that we could've been stress free. Trying to get to our hotel cost us a lot of time which meant we didn't get to enjoy Mykonos as much as we would've liked, particularly given that this was our favourite island. Another night here would've been better.
With the benefit of experience, we rang ahead on Santorini to book a shuttle from the sea port to the hotel, but the tour provider gave us the incorrect arrival time which meant we had to, yet again, organise our own transport, which is challenging when there are hundreds of people also trying to get to their hotels.
I can't remember if there's an option to book this tour with 3- or 4- star hotels, but if there is an option, then I recommend 4-star. We had complimentary upgrades to 4-star hotels on two of the islands and they were briliant, whereas I didn't feel very comfortable at all in the 3-star hotel.
This tour gave us two nights on Santorini, so we booked a day tour through Viator which was well worth doing because there would've been too much spare time, otherwise. Another option is to hire a quad bike and explore the island under your own steam, but an international drivers licence is required.