With a walk in Anafiotika in Plaka, the Minister of Tourism, Vassilis Kikiliaand the Australian ambassador to Greece, Arthur Spyrou, formalized the reopening of his office EOT in Australia and specifically in Melbourne.

At the meeting, the prospects for further strengthening the cooperation between Greece and Australia in the field of tourism were discussed.

In his statements to the media, Mr. Kikilias underlined that the tourist season has started since the beginning of March, stressing that “tourism never ended in Athens, it lasted throughout the winter months and the proof is that for the first months of the year, January, February and March of 2023 we are well above both 2019 and 2022, while the pre-bookings for the summer season is around 20% above 2019 in revenue and arrivals».

Referring to his meeting with Mr. Spyrou, the Minister of Tourism pointed out that “it is a special honor for me to be here, in Plaka, with an excellent diplomat and ambassador of Australia to Greece, Mr. Arthur Spyrou, who honors his position as ambassador of his country, we have an excellent cooperation and I am very happy that of his days we managed with joint efforts to reopen the EOT office – which was once in Sydney – now in Melbourne. This is very important for us, because Australia is a very big market and we want it in Greece».

Did he reveal that “Mr Spyrou’s father was a manager in the Sydney office of the EOT in the 1970s. So, things came to this way, several decades later, in an “explosion” of the tourist stream in Greece, which is the result of very hard work and effort, to have him here and to help our effort and I want to publicly thank him very much».

For his part, Mr. Spyrou emphasized: “I think the season will be very long. In 2019 we had 340,000 Australians come and it’s going up, the trend is up. We know that the Australian tourist who will come here is not only coming for reasons of nostalgia – which are very important, of course, as you can imagine – but is also coming to experience something authentic».

In this context he added that “that’s why we’re here too, because there is nothing more authentic than the Acropolis and on this side of Athens, the Plaka. But, the authentic is also the trekking and climbing and diving. It is all these that have given a greater scope to the tourism of Greece, beyond the souvlaki and the sea. That is where the Australian will stand and that is what we will highlight with this effort».