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I am, later this year, going on a cruise that will go to ancient Olympia in Greece.

My cruise line's website claims that no professional photo and video equipment is allowed in the site of ancient Olympia.

I cannot find any information about that anywhere else on the Internet. Is this information even at all accurate? What exactly is "professional photo and video equipment"? Does a mirrorless interchangeable-lens camera already count as such?

The same web page also claims that no large bags are allowed there; is this true, and what counts as a large bag?

I do not want to ask my cruise line because I am probably not going to book their excursions; there seems to be a train line that is much cheaper. So any rules imposed by the cruise line would not apply to me.

wonderbear
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2 Answers2

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Now that my cruise is over, I can answer my own question.

I went in with an APS-C mirrorless camera, only empty SD cards (leaving those with already taken photos on the ship so no one would be able to delete them or force me to) and two lenses, one standard-zoom, one ultra-wide-angle. I took lots of photos both in the archeological site and the museum, and nobody told me not to do that or otherwise attempted to stop me from doing anything I did there. I saw other tourists with similar equipment too.

I did spot a sign that said that commercial/professional photography was not allowed (it did not seem to talk about equipment per se). This is of course very common and usually refers to outright filming music videos, movies, advertisements on the site, which an ordinary tourist has no interest in.

So the answer to the question is that there is nothing to seriously worry about.

wonderbear
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It's a UNESCO World Heritage Site, they are very careful at the site and officials can simply do whatever they want "because there are rules", and they not always explain why they do things, but if you don't break any big rules: like sitting on archaeological items like walls and pillars you are safe. =)

In this review you can read about a good experience of someone being there with a camera, you can also see in the pictures (6th picture) she has a large camera with her.

Jochem
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