Hotels gear up for tourist influx during festive season

Desy Nurhayati, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar | Mon, 11/02/2009 1:48 PM

Hotels around the most popular sites across Bali are preparing for an increasing influx of tourists planning to spend their Christmas and New Year's Eve holidays on the island.

Patra Bali Resort and Villas, located in Kuta, are almost fully booked for the festive season, reservation manager Tami Rahani told The Jakarta Post at the weekend.Some hotels have already experienced a surge in reservations from foreign and domestic tourists.

"Ninety percent of our 206 rooms and 22 villas have been booked for the last week of December until the first week of January, mostly by Australians. There are also some Japanese, European, and domestic tourists," Tami said.

She said that most of the reservations were made through travel agencies working in cooperation with the hotel, while the rest were made by the customers.

The Intercontinental Resort in Jimbaran is also preparing for the upcoming peak season.

"Most of our rooms are already reserved for the Christmas and New Year's Eve, but we're still expecting more guests. At least we still have more than a month ahead," said the resort's public relations director, Dewi Anggraini.

"We are also preparing some events for the New Year's Eve celebration," she added.

Westin Resort in Nusa Dua has half of its 342 rooms reserved for the year-end holiday. Most of the guests booked the rooms for between five nights to two weeks.

"We are expecting more reservations by mid November," said public relations director Renata Tjoa.

Renata said the resort would hold a special event titled Nusantara on New Year's Eve, presenting dances and cultural performances from across Indonesia.

Ratna Eka Soebrata, acting chairperson of the Bali and Nusa Tenggara branch of the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA), said the last week of the year until early January was always the busiest time for hotels and tourist operators, which usually saw hotels overbooked.

"European tourists usually reserve one year ahead," she said, adding that Europeans, especially the Dutch, were among the most frequent visitors to Bali besides Australians.

Not only are foreign tourists interested in spending their New Year holiday in Bali, domestic tourists from Java also flock to the island, driving their private cars and creating congestion in some main tourist sites.