Greece Travel Essentials

Greece runs on the same electrical standard as most of continental Europe: 230 volts at 50 hertz, with type C and type F sockets, so anyone arriving from elsewhere on the continent needs no adapter at all, while visitors from countries on different systems need only the standard European adapter rather than anything specific to Greece. Tap water across Athens and most of the mainland is safe to drink, despite a persistent assumption among some visitors that bottled water is the only safe option; that assumption comes more from habits formed in other Mediterranean countries than from anything true of Greece itself. The one number worth keeping to hand while travelling is 112, the single emergency line that connects to police, ambulance, and fire services anywhere in the country.

Tipping is another area where expectations often outrun reality. In Greece it is customary rather than obligatory, and modest rather than the fifteen or twenty per cent that some travellers arrive expecting from habits picked up elsewhere: rounding up a bill or leaving a small amount for good service is normal, and no one is shortchanged by a straightforward payment with nothing added. None of this requires special preparation beyond what any trip to a European country would call for; the adjustments that matter are less about safety equipment or unusual precautions and more about recalibrating a few assumptions carried over from other trips and other countries.