Kavala Airport (Kavala National Airport ( Greece))

Member Name: catawall

Product:	Kavala National Airport ( Greece)
Date:	05/06/01 (1390 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: close to Thassos

Disadvantages: not enough seats

Kavala Airport is situated some 40km from the city of Kavala in Northern Greece, it serves the 5th biggest city in Greece. Its present location is to the east of the city. The original airport is located to west of the city & now is a military base. The decision to move the airport in the mid 80’s was due to the upsurge in tourism in the locality & the old airport frequently becoming fog bound.

Built in the mid 80’s Alexander The Great airport is a small airport comprising of just one terminal, & strangely enough two control towers, the reason for which I cannot fathom! The terminal is on one level with arrivals at one end & departures at the other.

The arrivals hall has 2 luggage belts & very few trolleys in evidence, the customs desk is just that, one small desk next to the exit door, which was unmanned on my arrival.

The main area has plenty of seats albeit rather uncomfortable metal ones, the terminal is air-conditioned; this was set at a very comfortable level, not too cold! There are just 8 check in desks that may well be adequate but as I was on a package holiday all 170 passengers were deposited at the same time & only two desks were open & the great British holidaymakers managed to form four queues for just two desks. The facilities offered in the main area consist of just one tiny shop & a refreshment area, which was horribly overpriced, e.g. a cup of coffee was generally priced at 500dr at the airport the coffee was priced at 700dr & was served in a plastic beaker & the taste was disgusting.

The monitors all two of them were very confusing as both showed both in arrivals & departures, if you were unsure of your flight number were not much help, all the displays were in English & all announcements were in both Greek & English.

It seemed strange that the passengers were not allowed through to the departure lounge until one hour before the flight was due to depart, the reasoning became apparent when w
e finally got there. The security & passport control formalities were very strict, all passports were checked thoroughly & the X-ray machines & gate appeared very sensitive with the smallest metal object being picked up.

The departure lounge was just one reasonable sized room with two departure gates. The lounge contained the usual refreshment area & a largish shop, this was not a duty free area & the prices were a little higher than similar goods bought outside the airport. The WC facilities were well laid out & spotlessly clean, as was the whole airport. There were also telephone facilities. There was nowhere near enough seats provided in this area mainly due to lack of space.

The terminal had two air bridges that were not used either on arrival or departure, instead a bus was provided on arrival & we were on foot across the apron for departure.

On reflection this airport was perfectly adequate for arrival/departure slightly off season with just 2 incoming flights on arrival & one on departure, in the height of the season the airport serves 30 flights a day, & the distinct lack of baggage trolleys would be a severe hardship for many & the seating would be woefully inadequate for more that 2 flights departing at a similar time. This is not an airport that would make a flight delay any easier to cope with.

Summary: