About Greece

Greece is famous worldwide as the cradle of human civilization. All visitors may easily visit museums, archaeological sites, monuments, cultural centers throughout the country, all year round. Visiting Greek museums and archeological collections throughout the country you can admire flourishing Greek art during a four-thousand-years history.

Neo-lithic, classical, Hellenistic, Byzantine or post-Byzantine, as well as modern pieces of art, are exhibited in more than 240 state or state-controlled museums, including galleries, historical or folk-lore museums. Traditional architecture, traditional settlements and historical city-centers are substantial elements of the cultural heritage and the character of our land. Ways of life, technical methods, aesthetic preferences, artistic movements and social relations, which were developed through an agitated historical evolution, are integrated in these elements.

The variety of forms of the greek architectural heritage is impressed in the 653 preservable traditional settlements, the 8.000 preservable buildings,as well as in the ancient and byzantine monuments, that can be found all over the greek countryside, the coasts, the mountains, the urban centers. The preservation and the integration of the architectural heritage into the tourism product is a prerequisite to sustainable tourism development and to creating alternative possibilities for all sorts of activities. Nowadays, many traditional buildings house new uses, such as accommodation, museums, exhibitions, restaurants, public and communal services etc.

Fortified sites, built with towers, bastions, walls, and citadels and fortified towns, are spread throughout Greece. Built by the Byzantines, sometimes on the same site of ancient fortifications, they have been enlarged and completed by Francs, Venitians, Genoats or Othomans. These castles, built in order to defend some strategic sites as well the populations form pirate or other invasions, they are testimonies of the historical course of the Greek land, bearing the marks of successive historical periods, construction techniques and cultural models. From the byzantine towers of Macedonia and Thrace, to the Venitian castles of the Aegean islands and Crete, as well as in the citadels of the Peloponnese and the Ionian islands, and also in the fortified monasteries, the visitor can find some relics of successive periods, of an inventive architecture, adapted to the geographical site and the natural ground.

Inside the fortification walls, one can find churches, accommodation buildings for the guard. Coasts. The country's onshore ecosystems are of extreme importance. The coastline's length is 15,000 km in total (of which about half is the coastline of islands) where there are sandy beaches, sandy strands, dunes, craggy coasts, onshore wetlands (lagoons, morasses, periodically flooded areas, salty fields, shallow brackish waters etc.) Islands. An essential element of the Greek tourism product peculiarity is the island phenomenon. A total of 227 inhabited islands (of which 164 are washed by the Aegean Sea) are part of the Greek territory. Still, only 78 islands have more than 100 inhabitants (1991 Greek National Statistical Service Census). 59.9% of the whole country's hotel units, 62.2% of the available rooms and 62.2% of the hotel beds is concentrated on the Greek islands.

Greece is famous for its vivid lifestyle. All visitors may have an excellent stay and experience a lot of pleasant activities. Apart from getting to know the culture, the idyllic countryside, the Greek gastronomy, visitors should meet the tingling greek life style. To start with, a lot of theatres, music cafes, trendy shops, music stages, cinemas, bars, night clubs, dancing clubs, funky restaurants, classy meeting points, casinos and after hours are easy to access everywhere in Greece, all year round. Usually, all night clubs opening hours are from 10.00p.m. until dawn. Nevertheless, it is easy to find places for entertainment during the day light as well. People of all ages may find a suitable place to have fun and to get to know the famous Greek life style. Almost everywhere visitors choose to go they will have the opportunity to discover their place of interest and feel warmly welcomed .