Who cares about biting cold when it’s bringing hot revenue
to the tourism industry with thousands of tourists spending generously on their
tour to snow covered Manali. Tourists, mostly newlywed couples, are enjoying
their first romance with snow and hoteliers are busy in counting the cash.
entering the town has doubled in a week. Majority of visitors are honeymooners.
Though few of them had booked their tours in advance, but most of the tourists
are heading to mountains after listening to the news of snowfall. Hoteliers,
who were disappointed by lean tourism season between August and November, are now
happy with rising business.
Hotel occupancy
rate which was below 20 per cent before December 10 has now increased to 50 to
60 per cent and is likely to go beyond 90 per cent after December 23. According
to general manager of hotel Beas View, MS Sharma, hotel industry had a bad time
till November but the snowfall has brought smiles back on the faces. “Many
honeymooners want to see snowfall. And high chances of snowfall are drawing
more and more newlyweds to Manali. We are expecting house full after December
20,” he said.
in hotel Mountain Top, said, “Many tourists are visiting Manali with unplanned
itinerary which means they just wanted to see the snow. We are hoping to
recover our losses of last four months in next three winter months. No doubt
snow is the backbone of tourism industry of Manali.”
Tourists’ crowd
in Manali has also cheered hundreds of restaurant owners and shopkeepers who
were suffering the slowdown. “I was selling maximum of 15 shawls a month till
November. Now this number has increased to 10 to 20 shawls a day. We are hoping
for more snowfall in Manali,” said Mohammad Maqbool, a shawl seller.
like Rohtang, Beas Nullah, Marhi and Gulaba have been closed for tourists after
heavy snowfall. Thousands of tourists are now enjoying skiing, snow scooter
ride, horse riding and paragliding at Solang valley.
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