Athenians abandon city, but not for usual spots

Capital, islands empty as citizens take shorter, cheaper trips

Athenians abandoned the capital in droves this year as they always do — despite the Olympics. But most of them have chosen destinations such as the Saronic Gulf — rather than the more remote, and expensive, Aegean islands — due to tighter budgets.

By Elena Becatoros - The Associated Press

They aren’t packing the stadiums to watch the Olympics. Their cars aren’t clogging the capital’s usually congested streets. But they haven’t shown up on holiday islands either. Most Athenians, it seems, have simply vanished.

August is Greece’s traditional vacation month, when city dwellers abandon their homes and head to beaches and islands in droves. Olympics organizers had been counting on that when considering how to ease Athens’s notorious traffic congestion during the Games.

In that respect, their plan has worked. Perhaps a bit too well, judging by the empty stands at many events. Traffic has been light, despite Athens’s nearly 2 million private cars only being allowed to drive in one lane on many major city roads, with the other two lanes reserved for official Olympics vehicles and public transport. Neighborhood streets where cars normally jostle for parking spaces are now almost empty.

“Life is very difficult,” said taxi driver Anastasios Dagres, complaining about the lack of customers in this city of 5 million people. “I’m about to quit because I can’t take this any more.”

But while many parts of Athens appear deserted, the city’s residents haven’t shown up at their usual summer haunts.

Many traditional Aegean Sea holiday islands are uncharacteristically empty. Bars and nightclubs are quiet; rental rooms and hotels have been slashing their prices in the hope of attracting customers. So where did everybody go?

“To holiday homes, to nearby destinations where they can come and go, such as the Saronic Gulf,” said Yiannis Evangelou, president of Greece’s Association of Travel Agents and Tourist Agencies, or HATTA. “They are taking short breaks of a few days, a week — not two weeks like they did before.”

Many simply can’t afford to go far, said Athens resident Christos Mermingis. “For financial reasons, people have gone to their holiday homes and to their villages. They’re trying to have as cheap a holiday as possible,” the 50-year-old said.

Prices have skyrocketed since Greece adopted the euro two years ago, and Greeks have seen their purchasing power plummet.

Then there’s the vacation ban imposed on tens of thousands of Athenians providing services considered vital for the Olympics, including bus drivers, hospital workers, police, firefighters and garbage collectors.

“Just in August, there has been a fall in vacation travel of about 25 percent,” Evangelou said, adding that the number could be made up by those who chose to travel instead in June, July and September.

Despite hopes of higher bookings from abroad by visitors hoping to combine watching the Olympics with touring the islands, many foreigners also appear to have stayed away, despite the Olympics.

“We have had an 11.5 percent reduction in charter flights,” said Spyros Galiatsatos, president of the Hoteliers Association of Cephalonia and Ithaca, two islands in the Ionian Sea. “For the first time, we have had a reduction, but not a terrible one as it is in other regions.”

About 14 million people visit Greece every year, and tourism makes up about 12 percent of the country’s gross domestic product. Analysts have offered various reasons for the decline, including overcharging, the strong euro, fears of terrorism during the Games, and difficulties in buying Olympic tickets.

Then there was the lack of successful advertising.

“The Olympics, due to a lack of communications strategy, a complete lack of strategy, made consumers afraid that they would find higher prices in Greece,” Galiatsatos said. “While Greece was the country of cheap drink, of cheap food, of free sun and sea, suddenly everything became very expensive.”

Still, with the Olympics now in full swing, there are hopes that both Athenians and foreigners will start heading to the capital.

“August isn’t one of the strong months for Athens, but this year, these days it will certainly fill up,” Evangelou said, adding that Athenians were waiting for the finals before heading to the stadiums. “Of course, we were expecting a bit more movement in early August, but the hotels... will fill up.”