Airlines will add more flights between the country’s two biggest cities and the central coast province of Phu Yen from March 31 till April 2 in anticipation of higher air travel demand during the National Tourism Year opening ceremony set on April 1.

Tran Quang Nhat, Director of the Phu Yen Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said that everyday there would be two flights from Hanoi and another two from HCMC to Tuy Hoa, Phu Yen during the three days. The daily flight frequency will fall to one from April 19.

“We’ve completed talks with airlines about the additional flights, ” he said.

Vietnam Airlines now flies once a day to Tuy Hoa from Hanoi and its subsidiary VASCO has one daily service between HCMC and Tuy Hoa.

Phu Yen has been chosen to host the National Tourism Year with the theme Beaches and Islands. Main events will be staged in the province and other supporting events will take place in other central provinces from Binh Thuan to Danang.

The organizing committee said around 30 culture; sports and tourism events would be organized in the central region during the year-long tourism promotion program.

Nhat said the province had over 2, 000 hotel rooms and 10 entertainment venues for tourists. The province’s tourism authority expects the coming festivities will attract around 500, 000 tourists to Phu Yen this year, up from the 320, 000 last year.

Many tour operators in HCMC have complained about the lack of information on the events throughout the year. Promoting tours to Danang is fine since the International Fireworks Competition as part of the tourism year program has been scheduled for April 29-30, while they have not been able to sell tours to Phu Yen and other provinces due to little information from these provinces.

Tu Quy Thanh, Director of Lien Bang Travelink, said the National Tourism Year events were good opportunities to attract holidaymakers as they would be taking place in the summer travel season. However, given insufficient information, Lien Bang Travelink has felt its hands tied in preparing Phu Yen tour programs.

“We have yet to get a detailed list of events in Phu Yen and other provinces, so we can’t arrange tours for tourists, ” he said.

(Source: SGT)