Since 1 July, Greece has reopened its borders to tourists in all regions, after flights to Athens were resumed in mid-June. The first crews to arrive were somewhat confused by the fact that the Greek authorities had not communicated well that every tourist must present a QR code when entering the country, either in writing as a printout or on a smartphone, which must actually be applied for 48 hours before entering the country. This is explained in a corresponding Order of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs regulated.
It states: "All visitors are strongly advised to install the Visit Greece app before travelling to Greece. Travellers should fill in the Passenger Locator Factor (PLF) with their local contact details in Greece, ideally before the flight."
Unfortunately, this form and the corresponding app cannot currently be found on the two websites of Visit Greece and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The easiest way to find it at the moment is probably via another official Greek website of the Civil Defence Office, which is to be found here.
The background to the requirement is that the Greek government randomly selects travellers for Covid-19 tests directly at the airport and then carries them out on site. If the test turns out positive later, the travellers are contacted and have to go into a 14-day quarantine. The costs for this are borne by the Greek state. Anyone familiar with the ailing Greek healthcare system may be sceptical about this. However, Greece has had very few cases of Covid-19 (just under 3,400) so far during the entire pandemic.
What is difficult for sailors is that they can only give the address of the charter company in the harbour of departure, but this does not really help in an emergency. Whether this is a problem remains to be seen, but so far there have been no reports of crews being turned back at the airport.
Andreas Fritsch
Editor Travel
