The number of visitors to the South Aegean exceeded 4 million, while the increase in arrivals to South Aegean islands, in the first twenty days of August, reached 16%. As announced by the South Aegean Tourism Initiative, arrivals to South Aegean broke all records this year, enjoying the benefits of their successful and safe management of the health and any other crisis the islands were called upon to deal with.

More specifically, from March, 27, when the 2022 tourist season started – earlier than ever before – until August, 21, the international arrivals were persistently higher even than the historic record of 2019. In particular, each month of the current tourist season is ending by achieving more arrivals than the corresponding month in 2019.

Arrivals on the Cycladic and Dodecanese islands are 16% higher than last year

The first twenty days of August show a 16% increase, always compared to the same period in 2019, sealing 2022 as the best tourist year in the history of the islands. In particular, all four international airports of the South Aegean, Rhodes, Kos, Mykonos and Santorini, for which comparative data are available, set a record for arrivals, as they attracted more than 700,000 passengers from the 1st to the 21st of August.

In particular, Rhodes has already exceeded 1.7 million international visitors, Kos has welcomed more than 800,000, Karpathos is approaching 57,000, Mykonos 450,000 and Santorini has surpassed half a million international arrivals. Adding up the passengers who have arrived from April to July via “Eleftherios Venizelos” at the airports of the South Aegean islands, international arrivals already exceeded 4 million, even before the end of August.

Finally, bookings and flight scheduling indicate that figures will remain high for the rest of August and autumn.

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