Destinations
HKTB Applauds Hong Kong-Singapore Bubble
An in-principle agreement between Hong Kong and Singapore to create a bilateral Air Travel Bubble (ATB) is giving travellers there reasons to celebrate. The milestone arrangement is designed to help revive cross-border air travel between the two aviation hubs in a safe and progressive way. Hong Kong and Singapore enjoy strong trade, investment, finance, tourism and people-to-people ties. Both cities are major aviation hubs, and the international air route between the two cities was among the busiest in the Asia-Pacific region before the pandemic. Travel links between Hong Kong and...
Planning To Stay Home For The Holidays
In its most recent international tracking study of American travellers, Longwoods International reports that half of American travellers are currently planning to stay home for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or New Years. A similar percentage reported that COVID-19 will greatly impact their travel decisions in the next six months. On the other hand, four in ten American travellers are planning a holiday road trip, while less than a quarter intend to fly. Travellers’ plans for holiday trips are equally split between Thanksgiving and Christmas, Hanukkah and...
Finding A New Mission
With a storm rolling in calling for rough seas with strong nautical winds and up to six metre swells, eco-tourism operators Kevin Smith and Russell Markel knew they were racing against time to remove the lift bags filled with tons of marine debris their crew and colleagues had collected over the last five weeks off the north coast of BC. “There’s no way we can be there in those conditions and we were worried that the bags were going to be washed out to sea,” says Markel, the owner of Outer Shores Expeditions, one of five small ship tour operators that made up the Marine Debris...
Guanajuato Gets Back To Business
The central Mexican state of Guanajuato, home to such colonial jewels as San Miguel de Allende and the state’s capital, Guanajuato City, has begun reactivating its tourist trade with the launch of its new brand that uses the slogan “Guanajuato, live great stories.” "We are inviting our visitors and tourists to be the protagonists of their own history, taking as a setting the tourist wealth of our state, as well as our World Heritage Cities, Magical Towns, archeological zones — every corner of Guanajuato,” said Governor Diego Sinhue Rodríguez Vallejo. “Today, from the heart...
Don’t Miss Tomorrow’s Sun Peaks’ Agent Webinar
Join Megan Nelson, Senior Market Development Specialist at Tourism Sun Peaks, on Thursday, October 15th at 10am (PST) for a Sun Peaks Webinar. Learn why Canada’s 2nd largest ski area is the ideal destination for your clients this winter. Whether they are skiers or snowboarders, looking to explore the outdoors through unique winter experiences or wanting to cozy up in a condo by the fire with a private hot tub, there is something for everyone. This educational session will include an overview on the destination in both winter and summer, accommodation, activities, terrain and...
A Difficult Decision
WestJet has announced that it will be indefinitely suspending operations to Moncton, Fredericton, Sydney and Charlottetown while significantly reducing service to Halifax and St. John's. The suspension eliminates more than 100 flights weekly or almost 80% of seat capacity from the Atlantic region starting Nov. 2, 2020. Ed Sims, WestJet president and CEO, explained: “It has become unviable to serve these markets and these decisions were regrettably inevitable as demand is being obliterated by the Atlantic bubble and third-party fee increases.” And Sims continued: “Since the...
Solomon Islands Records First Positive COVID-19 Case
Solomon Islands Prime Minister, the Hon. Manasseh Sogavare has confirmed the previously COVID-19-free country has recorded its first positive case of the virus. Addressing the nation on the weekend, the Prime Minister said the positive case was a student returning to the Solomon Islands onboard a repatriation flight from the Philippines. According to the Solomon Islands Ministry of Health & Medical Services (MHMS), while the student tested negative for the virus before leaving the Philippines, he subsequently tested positive on arrival in Honiara and was placed into immediate...
Experience France 360
Atout France will host its first large-scale trade event in the Americas since the beginning of the health crisis. From Oct. 19 to Oct. 22, tourism professionals from Canada, the United States, Mexico, Brazil and other Latin American countries will once again be able to connect with French suppliers and representatives of tourist sites and destinations in France. In addition to one-on-one virtual appointments (reversed workshop), France 360 will offer travel industry professionals training sessions and conferences to help adapt their sales strategies to various market segments and...