Hotel phones start ringing

The first few rays of sunshine have started to reach Greek tourism through the dark clouds of the pandemic, as the telephones at hotels have started ringing again and the websites of the major German tour operators are seeing visitor numbers growing. However, the booking icon is rarely clicked, while phone calls are mostly restricted to requests for information from this summer's potential travelers.

Some of the major hotel chains in Greece say their systems have enough active bookings - dating from the period before March 15 - for some of their units to operate with an occupancy rate of 50%: This is the very level considered to be the break-even point. Other major hotel groups have started seeing some bookings coming in, but only for October. They are all pinning their hopes on the season being extended up until early November in order to recover as much as possible from...