SOUTH AFRICA
Adventure specialist Acacia Africa
(
acacia-africa.com) puts a marked increase in hits to its website down to Attenborough’s paternal look at the continent’s resident creatures. Leanne Haigh, Sales & Marketing Manager, comments: “During the fi rst-quarter peak for bookings, web traffi c and sales were up by 15% on last year. There’s been a defi nite spike in interest. Africa showcased the raw nature of Africa and that appealed to a huge number of people. Culture and adventure are integral elements of any journey to Africa, but David Attenborough brought back magical safari moments that make this a one- of-a-kind continent.” Africa Collection (
africacollection.co.uk) is another operator that reports South Africa is back in fashion. “It fell off the radar for a couple of years, but
Opposite page: African penguins at Boulders Beach, near Cape Town; The scenic beauty of the Drakensberg Mountains, KwaZulu-Natal
the value-for-money proposition is back, with a weaker rand and sensible pricing…you just can’t underestimate the importance of value for money and price,” says director James Westrip. “The traditional product is doing
well – Cape Town, the Garden Route and safari –but we are fi nding that the safari and beach combinations are getting more varied, with Mauritius, Seychelles, Mozambique and even Zanzibar being combined with South Africa,” he added. The last six months have also
been encouraging for African Pride (
african-pride.co.uk) with KwaZulu-Natal and the Kruger showing growth,” says David Holland, Sales Manager. “The classic Western Cape and Garden Route trip remains ever- popular but people are looking for something more than an ‘off the peg’ Cape Town; they look to specialist operators like us to guide them and make sure they are seeing the best the area has to offer as well as some
things they might otherwise miss. “One example of this is an
alternative Cape tour African Pride promotes in partnership with Grootbos Nature Reserve.
“Instead of following the crowds to Boulders Beach and Cape Point it goes a bit further along the coast to Stony Point, where there are more penguins and less people.”
Hotel group Sun International
(
suninternational.com) also saw a rebound in visitor numbers with year-on-year growth across both the leisure and business sectors.
“We saw a big comeback in leisure travellers with growth at all our Sun City properties and the Table Bay in Cape Town and it’s been a similar picture for the fi rst quarter of this year…overall, it’s a much more optimistic picture than this time last year,” says UK and Ireland Marketing Manager, Fiona Malan.
The recovery in visitor numbers started last year. According to South
www.sellinglonghaul.com April 2013 43
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