Air travel to the southeast corner of Europe substantially exceeded pre-pandemic levels in the peak summer months of July and August. The two largest destinations, Turkey and Greece, both exceeded pre-pandemic levels of international visitor arrivals by 9% and 2% respectively, according to database management company Forwardkeys.
Air travel to Albania (a relatively small destination with less than 1% market share of European flight arrivals) was also up by 28%. The list of best-performing city destinations was headed by Istanbul, which recorded a 2% increase in flight arrivals.
Two major factors driving the strong performance of Turkey were an ongoing decline in the value of the Turkish lira and the country’s openness to the Russian market, from where direct flights to most of Europe have been banned. In the summer of 2019 Russians accounted for 4% of all arrivals to Europe, whereas in 2022, this dropped dramatically.
Greece has also performed strongly as a destination throughout the pandemic by implementing relatively visitor-friendly COVID-19 travel restrictions.
An analysis of origin markets reveals that within Europe, Greece has proved the most resilient, with departures for European destinations in July and August matching 2019 levels. The strongest extra-European market was the US, just 5% down on 2019. It was followed by Colombia and Israel, both 9% down, and South Africa, 10% down.
“The recovery from the pandemic has continued despite the travel chaos and capacity reductions caused by staff shortages. Right now, forward bookings for leisure travel show a continued recovery in air travel, post-pandemic; and, encouragingly, business bookings are catching up,” says Olivier Ponti, VP Insights ForwardKeys.
