The European Commission is making available EUR 1.5 million to create nautical routes linking up maritime heritage sights across Europe.

The main objective of this Call is to support the development of transnational thematic tourism products and their promotion through the creation of transnational touristic thematic routes in coastal regions in the areas of nautical tourism and water sports tourism at sea.

The tourism products developed should aim at promoting at least one of the following segments: nautical tourism and water sports tourism at sea. Applicants are encouraged to create and enhance synergies with other relevant tourism segments such as food and wine tourism, culture tourism, health and wellbeing tourism and cruise tourism.

The routes created by the projects must be innovative in the sense that they result in a diversification of the coastal and maritime tourism offer in Europe.

This action will involve the conception, development, establishment and promotion of transnational touristic thematic routes in the European coastal areas.

This call aims at realising the following specific objectives:

• Encourage diversification of the supply of European nautical tourism related products and services by the development of sustainable transnational nautical routes and associated tourism products;
• Foster synergies between tourism related activities on the coast and increase the benefits for the local economy and people;
• Foster transnational cooperation among various actors along the tourism value chain with regard to nautical tourism, water sports tourism at sea and related tourism segments;
• Reinforce market uptake and visibility of sustainable European transnational nautical routes and encourage their promotion to the public, encourage partnerships between different tourism segments and encourage synergies between different destinations.

The geographic area covered by the action includes European coastal areas and sea basins involving EU Member States and third countries participating in the respective cooperation frameworks (e.g. Action Plan for a Maritime Strategy in the Atlantic area, EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region, EU Strategy for the Adriatic and Ionian Region, Black Sea Synergy, BLUEMED), excluding volatile regions.

Deadline for submitting applications is 15 March 2017.

More information about the present call you can find here: https://ec.europa.eu/easme/en/call-proposals-nautical-routes-europe