Crete, Greece, Targets Chinese Travelers With New Initiatives

Heraklion Port.

Promoting Crete as a leading tourist destination to the Chinese market and establishing strong ties between the two countries was the aim of a recent visit to China by Region of Crete representatives and the Heraklion Port Authority.

The Cretan delegation’s primary goal is to penetrate the Chinese market, particularly four of its provinces – home to some 600 million people -, paving the way for cruise tourism in the Aegean and boosting tourist arrivals to the island.

It is estimated that by the year 2020, six million tourists will be traveling on cruise liners annually.

The Region of Crete is also planning to capitalize on the success of the “Rose Weddings 2014” initiative, which attracted wedding tourism to the island last April. Couples from Shanghai and Fujian have already expressed interest in scheduling their weddings on the island this coming summer.

During the visit, Heraklion Port authority president and CEO Ioannis Bras and Tourism advisor for the Region of Crete Mihalis Vamiedakis offered the Guangdong Foreign Affairs Museum a bronze replica of the famed Phaistos Disk (photo right).