NEWS FLASH
Pegasus Airlines is growing its network out of Antalya with the addition of seasonal summer flights to Skopje and Pristina. It comes after the airline scheduled new services between the coastal city and Sarajevo for next year earlier this week. Operations to Pristina will commence on June 1, while flights to Skopje begin a day later on June 2. Both routes will be maintained four times per week with the 188-seat Airbus A320 aircraft. Turkey’s SunExpress already operates seasonal flights between Antalya and Pristina, while it runs a year-round service to Skopje. Furthermore, Turkish Airlines’ lower cost unit AnadoluJet flies between Antalya and Skopje during the summer. Further flight details for the new Pristina flights can be found here, while additional information for the new Skopje service can be viewed here.
There are also summer charters between Skopje and Antalya by Tailwind Airlines, Corendon and Southwind Airlines. Pegasus scheduled this route to Skopje two years ago i think but decided to cancel the plans. Anyway, its always a good addition. This means that there will be 21 flights a week between Skp and Antalya next summer.
ReplyDeleteWho flys this route? Turkish tourists to Macedonia or Macedonian tourists to Turkey? Or both? Seems to be a lot of demand.
Delete99% of passengers are Macedonian tourists. Also Southwind flights are also on free sale, bookable on their website.
DeleteAntalya is the number one destinations for Macedonians, all agencies are now offering full packagces for Turkey. Even now there are offers for next summer. Plus maybe some Turks who live here use this line to go back home.
Deletesure but those SunExpress flights (both Izmir and Antalya) are also targeting turkish tourists on group Balkan tours.
DeleteTurkey is the favorite destination for Macedonians. I wonder if Heraklion, Rhodes, Thessaloniki would work?
ReplyDeleteThere were summer charters in the past by Avioimpex and MAT.
DeleteFlights to Thessaloniki definitely will not work...everyone is going by car there, what will work is to improve the border crossing through Bogorodica and Dojran during the summer season... :)
DeleteI always wonder if can work charters to Zanzibar or Thailand, that would be interesting๐๐
DeleteI was puzzled when I saw Fly One operating from Chisinau to there, why not us?
As for Greece - Heraklion, Rhodes, Corfu, Kos can do the job.
Still not so much demand for those exotic routes. All of the packages are with Turkish Airlines. We first need flights to Barcelona, Malaga….
DeleteYes. But interesting fact is that KIV have Zanzibar on their timetable. One day and SKP.
DeleteSky Up (and their tour operator Join Up) have quite a few flights to Zanzibar from Eastern Europe this year.
DeleteSkopje - Thessaloniki?! Why?
Deletefor Halkidiki packages probably
DeleteSkopje really needs flights to Spain. At least the agencies can start to offer some Spanish holidays with charter flights. I think this will happen soon. We got Tunis flights two years ago, and this summer we had flights to Enfidha, Djerba and Monastir which is huge increase when compared to two years ago when we only had Monastir. Also skp had six or seven weekly flights to Hurghada this summer, also an increase when compared to the four weekly flights last year. Next year, Skopje - Malta will be increased on three times per week.
ReplyDeleteThe demand for AYT is definitely high in Macedonia, we are having for first time year round flights to AYT
ReplyDeleteAntalya has 4% market share at SKP according TAV (I-IX) which means 85,6k passengers if I calculated correctly. I had the impression there were fewer charters to AYT than last year but those winter flight will push this number up
Delete266,184 Macedonian tourists visited Turkey last year according to Wikipedia. Honestly I think they are much more, even the capacity that the airlines offer is more or less that much? As for the buses, they are also many, every day. In fact, as the colleague above said, all tour operators offer Turkey.
ReplyDeleteAnd they also offer holidays to Istanbul almost every week and defenetly every spoen vikend. I think the numbers are way higher, considering how many buses there are, plus people going with cars. Most of the pax using THY are transit though, idk if those are included in the numbers you presented. I also dont know why we still dont have flights to Ankara and Spain, as well as Sharm el Sheik.
DeleteBH Air joins Egypt, probably the next is SSH. For Barcelona, I'm crossing my fingers for Wizz Air (probably with subsidies).
DeleteI've always wondered how they count tourists, actually the numbers I think are over 2 million
So, holiday destinations for Macedonians are currently Turkey, Greece, Egypt, Tunisia, Malta, Spain. It's sad that DXB is still absent.
DeleteIs Treviso destination for work or is holiday destination? Also ATH what is the number of holiday passengers? And transfer passengers?
DeleteAll Treviso flights are full of albanians, 90%. But what is intresting is that when it is Venice instead of Treviso like this winter, the flights are mostly with tourists and macedonians. Bologna is almost always with tourists as well as MXP and FCO.
Delete@15.03 gluposti
Delete15:03 ๐ ๐
Delete@15:16 Shto e glupost?
DeleteThe timing of these flights are much better compared to the other airlines which have flights in the middle of the night or very early morning...
ReplyDeleteYes but those times that you said are perfect for everyone. You arrive in your hotel at 7AM and you leave it at midnight. So basicly you have the whole last day in the hotel, full 7 days which is perfect.
DeleteYou arrive in the hotel at 7AM dead tired, since you're awake pretty much whole night, and the only thing you are looking for is the bed and you'll sleep whole day and go to a dinner :). Same for the return, I got your point for the whole last day, which is fine if you're not travelling with kids, but with kids, especially toddlers and babies, the only thing you need after you're out of the room is to get on that plane asap :)
DeleteYes i understand you. I ve been twice to Antalya and it is exsausting but its good that you have the whole day. When i arrived the first day i slept on the beach hahha. Turkey is very cheap for kids as they can travel for free under 12 years, but i cant understand why some people are going there with babies when they know how complicated it is to fly with a baby and everything else. Just get in the car and go in Greece or Albania. This is my opinion.
DeleteKids are staying for free, you still need to purchase the plane ticket > 2 yrs old
Deletei know
DeleteDoes anyone have any information if the tour operators will continue their work at SKP with BH Air?
ReplyDeleteProbably yes
DeletePegasus will operate four flights to Skopje on Sundays: twice from SAW and once from Antalya and Izmir. It will be the second busiest airline after Wizz Air.
ReplyDeleteWondering if they consider Ankara flights
ReplyDeleteIsnt Pegasus already flying to Skopje? i know i have flown on may flights in the past 10 years
ReplyDelete