Santorini

Firefighters sent to put out a blaze that started in a hotel on the island of Santorini found the body of a man in its premises, the fire service said.

The hotel is located on the cliffside village of Oia.

The four firemen were able to extinguish the small blaze quickly, the fire service said, without providing further details on the body.

For Giorgos Georgoulas, an experienced tourism professional on the world-renowned Greek island of Santorini, this summer will be really tough for tourism.

"This is a tragic, a disastrous year. We will just try to cover a fraction of our expenses this summer," said Georgoulas, who runs a boat tour agency at Oia town on Santorini.

Greece is opening its borders to mass tourism in stages, starting mid-June, hoping its success in containing the COVID-19 pandemic will attract visitors from abroad.

Greece is prepared for a huge drop in visitors from last year's 33 million, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis acknowledged Saturday.

Greece is prepared to welcome tourists this truncated summer season without discounting safety rules for visitors and locals, Prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Saturday, during visit to the popular island of Santorini.

Divers cleaned up the seabed in the old port of Fira on the island of Santorini for the first time on Monday, removing 340 kilograms of waste. The operation was organized by members of the island's diving centers and volunteers.

"The caldera has a peculiarity, the slopes are steep at its bottom," said Dimitris Kampanos, a diving instructor.

A recently founded environmental group, Dive in Action, is organizing an ambitious cleanup of the old Fira harbor that once served as the main port for the popular Greek holiday island of Santorini.

GREECE is opening their beaches again this weekend as the country lowers the lockdown restrictions put in place during the pandemic.

However, visitors will face strict measures and guidelines - which include no booze, music or sports games.

The new rules have been implemented by the Infectious Diseases Committee at the Health Ministry.

About now, Charlie Chahine should be welcoming his first international guests of the season to his Suites of the Gods resort on Santorini, Greece's most popular holiday island.

The beaches in Santorini have new benefits - the sunbeds are surrounded by frames made of Plexiglas, which serve as a precaution against the coronavirus, said "Kathimerini". In this way, the hoteliers on the island rely on their guests to return to them again.

There is a new addition at a bar on Santorini. The beach lounge chairs are surrounded by plexiglass screens, a precaution against coronavirus once the island starts getting visitors again.

Beach bar owner Charlie Chahine says he does not like it, but if that is the way it has to be for tourists to return, then that is what he is doing.