Safe to holiday in Greece?

[malachite]

Hi,

We are looking for a budget last minute family holiday and Greek islands have always appealed to us plus they are one of the only places we can find within our budget.

I'm hoping there's someone here more knowledgeable than me about what's happening over there at the moment. From what I understand the rioting is confined to cities in the mainland, but is that likely to spread?

Also, would we be able to access money from cash machines if we need to or cash traveller's cheques? I would not be happy about carrying all the cash we will need for the holiday on us.

TIA

I'm in rhodes now and you would never know there was a problem. Definitely book it. (I did take all cash tho after warnings in British press).

We are going on Sunday, self-catering for a fortnight, and are taking enough cash to cover everything if we need to. If you aren't prepared to do that, it's probably not the holiday for you at the moment - although I've heard that some supermarkets/petrol stations will still take cards, I'm hearing that restaurants, tavernas and so on only want cash.

I have friends in Greece who are saying that they will start to have serious supply problems for their business shortly. They can now take out an increased amount each week but its still very limited and not enough to enable their business to operate. Their view is that most people have managed so far but lots of people are hitting the point where their supplies are seriously depleted now.

You will need to take enough cash to last you for your entire holiday if you go. The restrictions on bank withdrawals are not the same for tourists but the ATMs are not all being restocked regularly.

It might be easier if you are on an all inclusive package.

The Foreign Office advice is to take all your money in cash last time I looked. You can use hotel safe/splitting between all the adults. I think you will struggle with travellers cheques/using cards to pay for things. I don't know about the rioting aspect.

Thanks!

I hope your holiday goes well LeBearPolar! I think I will aim to find something else this year if possible.

We are going to Corfu next week. I have been chatting to people out there on trip advisor and facebook pages and they are all saying that nothing has changed there. There is plenty of food, the cash machines are working and the only way you would know there were problems was by watching the news.

We will be taking cash just in case but we are very much looking forward to our holiday.