The 49th Wine Festival, held annually in the southern coastal town of Limassol, the main winegrowing region of Cyprus, will open its doors on Friday. The Wine Festival, to last until September 5, is hosted at the Limassol Municipal Park, as every year, with the participation of the four wineries of Limassol. Thousands of local and foreign visitors are expected to enjoy the festival. The Wine Festival will be officially opened by the Minister of Trade, Industry and Tourism Antonis Paschalides. Addressing a press conference, Mayor of Limassol Andreas Christou said that the Wine Festival is very important to the town and as such the aim is to further develop and upgrade this annual festival.

The Mayor also referred to the bus routes (Wine Express), supported by the CTO, and scheduled to transfer residents of Nicosia, Larnaca, Agia Napa and Paphos to the Wine Festival for free.
President of the CTO, Alekos Orountiotis, said that the organization has been supporting the Wine Festival for the past three years and that the festival is one of Limassol’s greatest events, launched as a cultural event of broader scope.

To mark the opening of the festival, a wagon will travel around Cyprus carrying men dressed in traditional costume offering wine. Throughout the years, the Limassol Wine Festival has become a traditional feast, very popular among the local population as well as tourists. The Festival’s trademark is a 7-metre statue of a man dressed in the Cypriot traditional costume “vraka”. Above the statue is written the motto “Drink wine, live long”.