Austria reopening to vaccinated UAE travellers with no quarantine

Austria will welcome tourists from the UAE, and across the GCC, from July 1.

The European country famed for its ornate palaces and untouched nature is reopening to vaccinated travellers from more destinations from next month, with unvaccinated children under 18 also welcome to visit.

Fully vaccinated citizens and residents from the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar will be able to fly to Austria with no quarantine rules.

Six vaccines are accepted for travel: Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna, Sinopharm and Sinovac. Travellers are considered vaccinated for six months after their final dose.

To mark the return of travel, the Austrian Tourism Board has launched a campaign entitled Travel Builds Bridges, with the aim of "rebuilding the bridge between people and countries to once again celebrate the freedom of travel and tourism".

The campaign runs across 15 countries and encourages travel to Austria for holidays, business, education and medical tourism.

"Welcoming travellers from the GCC is not only a revival to the tourism scene in Austria, yet a great opportunity to explore and exchange experiences, strengthen cross-cultural ties and join forces in bridging between people to better promote travel and tourism between Austria and the Gulf countries," said Robert Groblacher, director for Middle East at the Austrian National Tourist Office.

"We are looking forward to welcoming travellers from this region to Austria again."

Travellers from Saudi Arabia are already welcome to visit Austria so long as they can show a vaccination certificate, proof of recovery from Covid-19 or a negative PCR test.

Travellers with passports from the EU, Switzerland, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway can also already visit Austria for tourism purposes.

Emirates and Etihad flying direct to Austria

Flights from the UAE to Austria take around six and a half hours and there are several options for travel.

From Abu Dhabi, Etihad will launch flights to Vienna from Sunday, July 18 with fares from Dh1,995.

Emirates flies direct to the Austrian capital from Dubai with fares from Dh1,800. Low-cost airline flydubai will operate flights from Dubai to Salzburg, the city of music, from Thursday, July 15.

Passengers flying into the UAE capital from Austria will not have to quarantine as the country is listed on Abu Dhabi's Green List.

Elsewhere in the region, Qatar Airways flies three to four times weekly from Doha to Vienna.

Saudi Arabia's flynas and Saudia have plans to add Austria to their networks by mid-July, giving travellers from the kingdom direct options for travel.