For Heathcote Grape Escape Tours it had been a hard few weeks of constant cancellations, little business and no government assistance.

Owner Joe Nigro said all tours and accommodation bookings were cancelled for the coming weeks.

More news:

He said although regional Victoria was open to travel, under the current restrictions tours could not go ahead.

"Most of my clientele come from Melbourne, interstate or international, so most of the bookings for even accommodation have been cancelled," he said.

"I have lost two weeks of accommodation and money from wine tours and I also do some transport for wineries when they have functions and that's all gone and I've lost money from all that.

"I haven't had any assistance at all over the pandemic."

Last week, the Heathcote On Show volunteer committee made the heartbreaking decision to cancel its Queen's Birthday long weekend food and wine festival for the second year in a row.

Mr Nigro said he felt disappointed the festival was cancelled.

"It's not their fault, there isn't much you can do, it's just disappointing," he said.

"Lots of people come into town for Heathcote On Show, and I had a steady stream of work over the three days.

"It's a shame because it brings so many people to Heathcote, everyone gets a piece of the action, the accommodation providers, wineries, pubs and services all share in it."

Mr Nigro said it wasn't all bad news, after the first half of the year was heavily booked.

"Normally the majority of the wineries work hard up until Christmas and a bit after that and then usually it slows down," he said.

"But that wasn't the case this year, people really wanted to get out and about.

"It was really good because it was good for the wineries and everybody was getting around it."

Mr Nigro hoped with the further easing of restrictions hinted in the coming days would allow for tours to get back up and running.

Daylesford Wine Tours owner and operator Clayton Watson felt similarly.

He said tour operators across regional Victoria were completely forgotten during the latest lockdown.

Mr Watson said operators had seen 100 percent of their bookings cancelled during their busiest month of the season.

"The tours division regionally has been completely overlooked - once again - by the Victorian government," he said.

"There's a huge grey area within our sector where our core operators are forced to call each other to actually find out what we are and aren't allowed to do.

"Every sector seemed to be covered very well by the Victorian government but the tour operators.

"We've got no international, no interstate, no Melbourne and now no regional visitors allowed to tour with us."

More news:

With travel off the cards for Melbourne residents at the long weekend, Mr Watson said it would have a big effect on the industry.

"The slow trickle of information the tour operators receive will probably mean we find out we could have operated this weekend in a month's time," he said.

Mr Watson said tour companies such as his ensured top COVIDsafe protocols were followed.

"We absolutely smashed our intensive COVID cleaning of our buses - adding some two to three hours of work everyday - as well as our cellar door partners," he said.

"We really upped the ante on strict guidelines, QRs, temperature checks, tracing lists etcetera, much to the demise and exorbitant costs added to our small profit margin and overheads."

Other news:

After enduring four lockdowns since March last year, Mr Watson said this week would be make-or-break for many tour operators in the regions.

"We urge the Victorian government to do the right thing and reimburse us and allow us to operate instead of being looked at like a big grey ball," he said.

"The time has come and gone already numerous times - let us do our job and deliver customers professionally and safely as per usual."

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can access our trusted content: