Riding a record run of tourism seasons that brought an economic recovery but not wanting to get complacent, Cyprus needs to promote its mountains and other attractions as well as the allure of beaches and sunshine to get more people to come,  Deputy Minister for Tourism Savvas Perdios said.

Perdios had a meeting with Limassol Mayor Nikos Nikolaides and mayors of neighboring municipalities to talk about ways to show tourists there’s more than just sun and sand and there are other places to visit, the Cyprus News Agency (CNA) said.

Perdios told CNA that Limassol saw a big jump in growth in recent years but that his agency wants to make sure that continues as it is already working on a 2030 National Strategy for Tourism.

He said there’s infrastructure to attract more cruise ship arrivals at Limassol’s port and was optimistic there would be an increase in traffic in the next few years, the report said.

There’s some reason for worry as tourist arrivals in March showed a big drop percent over the previous year although it came during the winter season, typically slower, before summer brings the hordes.

For the period of January-March 2019, tourist arrivals amounted to 357,475 compared to 369,438 the corresponding period in 2018, a fall of 3.2 percent.