When it comes to attracting visitors for what is shaping up to be a huge summer travel season, it really pays for destinations to get out ahead of the pack. Last week, the European Union announced that its member countries would soon open to vaccinated travelers from outside the bloc, including Americans.
Very soon, those who are fully inoculated with E.U.-approved vaccines — including Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson — will be allowed to enter E.U. countries without having to produce a negative Covid test result or quarantine upon arrival.
But Greece already has a jump on its E.U. partners. The gorgeous Mediterranean nation is already open to travelers inoculated against Covid-19, and that has fueled something of a boom.
On the travel deal-finding site Hopper, bookings to Europe are up 38% in May compared to April, and travelers are looking for places they can go with little hassle. While many Americans are already booking flights to the usual suspects — London, Paris, Madrid and Rome — in anticipation of the E.U. bloc’s reopening, it’s clear that Greece’s head start has paid off.
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So far this month, Hopper users have booked more summer flights to Greece than to anywhere else in Europe. Overall, booking volume for Athens is “up significantly” compared to this time in 2019, says Adit Damodaran, the site’s economist.
And there’s another big reason why Americans are booking getaways to Greece, points out Damodaran. Flights from the U.S. to Athens cost 18% less this summer than they did in 2019.
Greenlighting vaccinated travelers before most of the Continent clearly got the attention of the major airlines. There have never been so many non-stop flights from the U.S. to Greece, with new routes to Athens from Atlanta, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.
Read more: Forbes
