Living in Crete :: Olympic Airlines Safety First Video

Living in Crete or just visiting, there is every chance that as a British or Irish expat at some point you will have to take an Olympic Airlines flight getting to Athens. To anyone who has flown from Chania or Heraklion Airports you will know the chaos (a Greek word) of it being rush, rush, rush, a scrum to get through Olympic Airlines check in, x-tra security - that means doubling back to put checked luggage through the x-ray machine after you have checked in, if you understand what I mean .. and then the snaking line going through personal security check at the x-ray screening departure point. You also encounter the throw away bin with a pile of hundreds of discarded plastic PET (not the four legged kind) water bottles and desperate looking guys clutching their belts in one hand, and trousers/jeans in the other. The guys noticeably quake on sighting the burly, dragoness guarding the security gate... and if they are lucky, their e-ticket bits of paper getting soggier by the moment between their teeth as they slowly inch forward to countess dragula.

Suitably adjusted and if no further discussion over the removed gels from the ladies bags there is the wait in the claustrophobic departure area before the fresh air of the tarmac.

After the split second of transit time of being bussed to the aircraft, you climb up the aircraft steps to get on board your flight. For the purposes of this dissertation, it is an "OA" not "OK" designated flight number prefix. The momentary relief at actually having got this far is quickly overtaken by the need to push past a well proportioned Greek mamma mia with facial hair notably in the nostrils and sported above the upper lip.

You clamber into your seat. Next thing you know you are off,wheels rolling but not before the Olympic Airlines Safety Video:






Your Olympic Airlines experience has begun. Do we Brits and Irish fly Olympic ever again in getting to and from Crete? You bet. We are all masochists at heart ..... especially those of us who are living in Crete. After all when we are away, we can't wait to get back to Greece for more of the same. Kalo Taxidi.