According to travel companion site TravelSupermarket, Turkey has seen a spike in demand for late summer holidays accounting for 30% of all late summer holiday interest over the past fortnight. Mainland Greece has taken a slump with a 17% decline in interest, however the islands of Rhodes, Corfu and Sardinia have experienced an increase in demand of 80%, 46% and 37% respectively.
Interest in Kos has also doubled.
Demand for breaks in Poland increased 25% and Italy 18%.
Demand for holidays to Portugal has dropped by 57%, after it was removed from the list of quarantine-free travel destinations.
TravelSupermarket commentator Emma Coulthurst said: “There continues to be definite winners and losers in the outbound holiday market. No doubt, the adding by UK Governments of restrictions to some or all parts of Greece is a reason for the demand decrease for holidays to the country. However, some Greek Islands such as Kos, Rhodes and Corfu, which remain exempt from UK travel restrictions, have benefited from the UK travel advice against travel to other parts of Greece.
“In 2019, the average lead time via TravelSupermarket between people looking for and then departing on a holiday was six weeks,” she said. “This year, the average has reduced to four weeks.
“Over the last few weeks, we have seen a marked increase in people searching for holidays which are departing within a week. People are looking at average coronavirus daily case numbers, picking a destination and booking and going away very soon afterwards”.
