Sri Lanka - OutboundHolidays

Sri Lanka picked among top five travel destinations for…

Sri Lanka has been named among the top five destinations in Kuoni’s annual poll of where UK customers want to spend their holidays. Sri Lanka also retained the number one destination for weddings according to the report.

Where holidaymakers want to go is just part of leading tour operator Kuoni’s annual Travel Trends Report. The 20-page report also tracks hot travel trends and the top destinations for weddings and honeymoons, for families, for solo travellers, for pampering spa holidays, for the most exciting adventures and authentic experiences as well as the best destinations for those that care about the planet.

The report also highlights changes in holiday behaviour and includes trends in holiday booking behaviour, such as the importance of social media in driving holiday choices.

The top five holiday destinations for 2012 are the Maldives, Thailand, Sri Lanka, The United Arab Emirates and the USA.

Kuoni predicts that South Africa will witness huge growth over the next 12 months, helped by the exposure from the football World Cup last year and the weakened currency against sterling.

The only mid-haul destination in the 2012 Top Ten selling destinations is the United Arab Emirates, which kept its fourth position from last year. Abu Dhabi and Ras Al Khaimah account for the popularity of this region.

For specific types of holidays, the Maldives retained its top slot for honeymoon destinations and also topped the wishlist for digital natives, better known as Generation X, Y and Z.

Sri Lanka retained number one destination for weddings, Kuramathi Island Resort in the Maldives kept the top slot for family destinations, as did Thailand for solo holidays.

The winner of the Top 10 adventure holiday is the 11-day tour of culture-rich Sri Lanka on the Ceylon Tour, while those looking for the best Planet Friendly Holiday voted for Governors Main Camp in the wildlife safari heaven of Kenya.

The Report’s 2012 figures are based on holiday bookings made as at December 2011.

Kuoni has been undertaking the annual Travel Trends Report since 1980.

Thanks: Thorne Gazette.

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Sri Lanka develops tourism industry in North and East

Three years after eradicating terrorism form the country, Sri Lanka is taking measures to develop tourism in the former conflict-affected areas to economically strengthen the region and provide employment to the inhabitants.

Since the end of the war in May 2009, Sri Lanka is becoming popular as a hot tourist destination and has seen tourist arrivals rising every month setting an all-time high of 855,975 arrivals in 2011.

Under an ambitious plan the government has focused on developing the Pasikuda Tourist Zone in the eastern sea board as an attractive destination for tourists.

Until 1983 Pasikuda was a tourist haven and there were at that time. Due to the war the tourist industry in the area had a natural death and with the end of the war more and more tourist attention has been focused on this zone and it has become a very vibrant tourist area.

Under the observation of the Tourist Development Authority, the government has allocated Rs. 650 million for the development of the 150-acre Pasikuda Tourist Zone, which has become a very attractive location, especially, for the European tourists, Deputy Minister of Economic Development Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena said.

The Economic Development Ministry has already provided Rs. 275 million from this amount towards the project, the Minister has revealed.

According to the Minister, private sector businesses are investing Rs, 6.53 billion to construct 14 new hotels with a total of 930 rooms in the Pasikuda Tourist Zone.

The Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) has already finalized the conceptual design plan of the Zone with the association of Sri Lanka Institute of Architects (SLIA) and initial action have taken to prepare an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the whole resort.

The construction of hotels in the area and the anticipated heavy influx of tourists to the Zone once the construction is complete, are expected to provide direct and indirect employment to thousands of youth in the Eastern province.

“With the upsurge in tourist arrivals to the Zone the people around the area will get economically strengthened,” the Minister predicted.

The famous Pasikuda beach in Batticaloa district along the east coast has been a popular tourist resort among both foreign and local tourists until the onset of the war in 1983.

At the time there were 3 hotels with 171 rooms and infrastructure was set in place to expand to 500 rooms at different stages. After the riots in 1983 the development of the resort came to a grinding halt as the area engulfed in the conflict and subsequently, came under the terrorist control.

The government also plans to improve Nilaweli, and Arugam Bay, the most famous and beautiful beaches along the Eastern coast.

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Spice island Sri Lanka

The market was jam-packed. A tuk-tuk overloaded with huge bunches of green bananas almost ran over my foot, knocking me off balance. Intense aromas and stenches invaded all our senses. Bicycles and the tiny motorised carts vied with jostling shoppers and merchants for space in the frenetic and frantic Pettah bazaar in the heart of Colombo, Sri Lanka’s capital and centre of commerce.

On either side of the narrow alleys, market stalls were filled with piles of coconuts, bananas, jackfruits, okra, shallots, wing beans and string beans, eggplants, papayas, mangoes and – a surprise to me – a wealth of English vegetables, a hangover from colonial days.

Among these immense stacks of fruit and vegetables, sacks of rice, bags of spices, weeping packs of pungent tamarind and boxes of smelly savoury dried fish, our group of seven tourists and guide stood out like aliens.

We’d risen early, despite our 2am arrival on a flight from Singapore, and had a breakfast feast of egg hoppers, the crisp lacy rice-flour pancakes that are filled from a choice of curries and sambals. It’s a spicy way to start the day, but truly addictive.

An array of fresh tropical fruits and juices, including the unique woodapple (slightly sour and sweet at once), cauldrons of piquant curries and fresh buffalo curd are also among the goodies on offer at a leisurely breakfast on the colonial Mount Lavinia Hotel terrace.

With the warm monsoon wind blowing in our hair it was tempting to think about just lying by the pool. But we were off on an exploratory trip to see the bounty cultivated locally and learn just which foods would fashion our meals over the next 12 days. The market as always, proved to be a revealing place to get to the heart of the country.

We were on a food and architecture tour, led by Mary Taylor of Food Matters, an Auckland food writer who has been taking small groups to Sri Lanka for the past 10 years.

Her knowledge, contacts, calm nature and wry sense of humour proved ideal to lead us as we experienced the wonderful diversity and intensity of this lush island in the Indian Ocean.

The historic Mount Lavinia Hotel was the perfect starting point because the handsome chef Publis has cooked here for more than 50 years, attaining superstar status in Sri Lanka with a weekly cooking show, a regular radio broadcast and being singled out by Rick Stein to cook for his television programme.

We had him all to ourselves in the hotel kitchen as he introduced us to Sri Lankan cuisine. We watched as he whipped up hot and devilled deep-fried fish, fragrant baby potato curry, wok-fried spicy vegetables, a dry curry that was picture-pretty with green snake beans and baby pink shallots, and a load of accompanying sambals and roti breads to eat with the focal point – the rice. A truly spicy early dinner that awakened every taste bud in my mouth and left me licking my fingers and plate.

Sri Lanka’s cuisine draws many influences together to create food that’s gloriously varied. The teardrop shaped island sits off the south eastern coast of India, with a string of islets stretching to the west that make it seem possible to almost walk to the sub-continent.

Indian cuisines from the adjacent Kerala and Tamil Nadu regions have made their mark, and Malaysia, lying to the east of Sri Lanka has also influenced the food. Historically Arab traders, Portuguese explorers and Dutch and English colonials also passed through leaving their distinct influences to be absorbed into the buildings, monuments, art, churches and of course, the food.

Over the past 10 years Sri Lanka has experienced a well publicised civil war and the 2004 tsunami wreaked havoc on the country’s coastal regions, putting development on hold until very recently. Yet pot-holed paving and bone-shaking buses cannot take away the incredible beauty of the lush green countryside, geometric rice paddies, dark green tea plantations covering the hillsides, and the luxurious canopy of tropical cloud forest.

There’s also an unexpected elegance evident in the buildings and hotels.

The late Geoffrey Bawa, a Sri Lankan who studied architecture in Britain, spent his working life in Colombo and has left the country a legacy of stylish hotels and buildings and spread his minimalist influence across South Asia. We visited his home, ate in his former office – now the Gallery Cafe, a cutting-edge restaurant, bar and store – stayed at his famous eco hotel, Kandalama, and at the Jetwing Lighthouse, on the rocky coast near Galle in the south.

For those with a penchant for ancient history Kandalama is within easy driving distance of three Unesco World Heritage sites: the medieval city of Polonnaruwa; a spectacular rock fortress at Sigiriya with water gardens and a breathtaking climb to amazing views; and Dambulla, complete with temple, 15m golden Buddha and a complexity of ancient caves.

North of Colombo, the famous Negombo Fish Market afforded us a view of the vast variety of seafood that forms such a large part of the Sri Lankan diet.

We watched small sailboats manoeuvring in and out of the harbour, as locals bargained and traded their catch. We made a new friend, who was desperate to tell us he too had appeared on “Ricky” Stein’s programme and had even laminated the TV chef’s business card to prove it.

He showed us acres of small fish drying on mats in the sun; fish that are salted and used in local cooking to give the salty pungent flavour to Sri Lankan food.

We observed a staggering quantity of coconuts at the Silvermill coconut factory, rolling down to be husked, peeled and shredded before disappearing into a vast drying machine to emerge as desiccated coconut. The smell of toasting coconut was pervasive. Sri Lankans harvest three billion coconuts each year, exporting 25 per cent of the crop in various forms, and consuming the rest.

A train took us from the hill capital city of Kandy to Hatton. Our rickety ancient wooden carriage rattled and jiggled on the narrow gauge railway as it climbed into the mountains. With tickets reserved for first class observation seats, I had visions of a glass dome that popped up above the roof. No such luck.

“Observation” meant a window in our carriage at the rear of the train giving us a view back down the track as we climbed up to Sri Lanka’s important tea growing region. But at every little stop along the rural way hawkers plied us through the windows with delicious snacks. Warm wade, spicy dhal fritters with sweet corn, and soft sweet doughy ulundu wade.

In Hatton locals were holding a demonstration. It was Saturday, and by Monday the wages of thousands and thousands of tea workers had been raised from 415 to 515 rupees a day. We felt a part of their triumph, cheering the pickers out in the fields plucking the tea, as we passed en route to our hotel.

Sri Lankan tea plantations are lush and beautiful with extensive sculptured waves of bushes. We relaxed for a couple of days at Ceylon Tea Trails‘ Norwood Bungalow, one of four planter’s bungalows on adjoining estates that have been converted to luxury accommodation.

Tea was served constantly. A selection of teas for breakfast, mid-morning tea, high tea at 4pm with cute cucumber sandwiches and dainty cakes, and to top it off, a delicate tea-infused four-course dinner, cooked by a very modern chef.

The witty and erudite Andrew Taylor, a direct descendant of James Taylor, who introduced tea to Sri Lanka from China, expertly guided us through the Norwood Estate tea factory.

Small green buds with the accompanying two leaves below are hand plucked from the bushes and within 24 hours of arriving fresh and dewy at the factory are processed and graded to become tea that’s ready to be shipped to the government-run tea auctions in Colombo.

This painstakingly hands-on process produces high quality tea that is strong and dark, not to my taste, but definitely the preferred taste sought around the globe.

Nuwara Eliya, a resort town high in the hills with a distinct English feel right down to its very grand and proper Grand Hotel and adjacent manicured golf course, was another welcome stop.

We shopped for saris, sapphires and clothing bargains: surplus goods and seconds from Sri Lanka’s international clothing industry are sold at unbelievably low prices in the local market.

We wound our way up a rough track, deeply pot-holed and bumpy, to the cleverly converted Heritance Tea Factory Hotel. A welcome cup of sweet spiced tea awaited, another tasty buffet of rice and curries and a blissfully comfortable sleep in the cool air of the mountains.

Back down on the coastal plains we passed beautiful resort beaches, and visited a transit house for more than 40 baby orphaned elephants, arriving in time to see them rushing in for hand-fed milk rations. That project, along with many other sensitive initiatives, has been funded by the Dilmah Foundation.

The gracious Merrill Fernando, Dilmah’s founder, who is well known to New Zealanders, joined us for a drink on the colonial balcony of the famous Galle Face Hotel in Colombo before we flew out. I think of his family’s generosity and philanthropy, and dream about the beauty of his country with every cup of Sri Lankan tea I drink.

CHECKLIST

Getting there: Singapore Airlines offers daily flights from Auckland to Singapore and daily flights to Colombo.

Cathay Pacific offers daily connections from Auckland to Colombo via Hong Kong.

Further information: You can find out about Mary Taylor’s tours at foodmatters.co.nz.

* Lauraine Jacobs, food columnist for the NZ Listener, travelled privately to Sri Lanka – By Lauraine Jacobs

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Sri Lanka – The land of leisure

The first thing that struck me as I exited the Bandarnake International Airport in Colombo were the clean roads and the lack of blaring horns. Another thing that stood out for me was the polite and hospitable nature of the Sri Lankan cab driver who drove me from the airport to the city. I was in Sri Lanka for a week primarily to visit the country of my literary research and to attend an International Film Festival in Kandy. Colombo, which is the capital of the country doesn’t quite embody the paradisiacal island image of Sri Lanka but the main sites like the shopping streets of Pettah, the excellent national museum in the heart of leafy Viharamahadevi Park and a evening in the scenic Galle Face makes this city a good place to start or end a journey through Sri Lanka.

I personally enjoyed my stay in Kandy than my time in Colombo. The Hill Country capital of Kandy remains the Sinhalese cultural and spiritual centre for Sri Lankans. The town houses the ‘Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic’ in which a very important Buddhist relic — a tooth is preserved. This temple was damaged when a bomb was detonated by the LTTE in 1998. The scars have been now repaired but security remains high and there is significant screening for all visitors. While in Kandy, it is a good idea to stroll into one of the many monasteries to get a glimpse of life in a Buddhist monastery.

I visited the Malawatte Maha Vihara right across the lake from the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic which has a giant Buddha statue that seems to look down at the town of Kandy. The Kandy International Film Festival (KIFF) which I was an attendee had an interesting array of Sri Lankan films lined up. Particularly, the one by Vimukthi Jayasundara ‘Between Two Worlds’ stood out for its emphasis on the recent ethnic conflict.

My trip was obviously too short to appreciate the gorgeousness of the island but I hope to return sometime soon and explore places that I didn’t have the time to cover this time.

TRIVIA
Kandy is the second-largest city of the island and the capital of Central Province of modern Sri Lanka. It was the last capital of the ancient kings’ era of Sri Lanka. The city lies in the midst of hills in the Kandy plateau, which contains an area of tea plantations. Kandy is widely considered as one of the most scenic cities in Sri Lanka.

SOUVENIR STOP
While in Colombo, it is a good idea to make a trip to Pettah, which is the shopping district. Make sure you bargain your way through buying souvenirs, or take a local along with you to avoid being fleeced. A souvenir that you must pick up is the miniature elephant showpiece. Available in wood or metal, these look real life-like and are sure to remind you of the elephant orphanage at all times.

The writer is a student at the National University of Singapore and enjoys travelling

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Whale watching in Sri Lanka

Spotting the world’s largest animal can be a thrilling experience provided you don’t expect too much, says Shruthi Mathews

I recently travelled to Sri Lanka with the intention of writing a travel piece. Admittedly, I spent less time travelling and more time, well, never mind, but my so-called travels did end up in a rather interesting whale watching excursion.

There are a lot of nice things for tourists to do in Sri Lanka, but whale-watching is one particular activity that seems to be experiencing quite a hike in popularity. There are several spots around the island where you can do this, depending on the season. Mirissa, which is on the southern tip, is considered one of the best sites in the world to spot both blue and sperm whales. I remember going there about four years ago and getting on a small, rickety sort of boat with a handful of people. Now I find myself climbing aboard a huge boat and being given food and bottled water — as well as a very professional-looking pamphlet about the tour.

How swiftly things change.

Whilst in Sri Lanka, I also happened to watch a film called Adaptation, which I’m reminded of as I sit down to write this. The main character, Charlie Kaufman, is a screenwriter faced with the task of adapting a book about orchids into a film. One of Kaufman’s issues (and he has many) is how to make a story about orchids interesting. I find myself in a similar situation when it comes to whales.

This isn’t to suggest that whales aren’t beautiful, magnificent wonders of the natural world — they are this and more; as are orchids. But whale-watching is a fundamentally underwhelming experience. Sort of like New Year Eve.

Anti-climax is the almost inevitable consequence of anything that has been, for want of better phrasing, ‘hyped up’ — and whale-watching comes with an inherent hype: the prospect of seeing the largest animal on earth in its natural habitat is, of course, fairly thrilling. So despite the early start (if travelling from Colombo to Mirissa, the journey to the harbour takes around three hours. The boat leaves at 6 am. You calculate) people are generally quite excited as they stand on the shores of the vast blue sea, filled with promise and expectation.

And there really is something quite ennobling about facing the ocean at sunrise and feeling the brisk sea-spray on your face. Personally, I had visions of myself as a young Odysseus about to embark on a perilous adventure filled with wondrous, mythical creatures; I glanced around and noticed that I wasn’t the only one caught in a reverie of some sort — although there was a significant group who seemed to possess a more Captain Ahab-like energy. Well, not in wanting to kill Moby Dick, but just being the first ones to spot him.

There were several false alarms before the actual sightings: “Whale! Oh, no… just a flying fish.” “Whale! No, no… a sea-turtle.”

But when we did eventually see one, it was truly exhilarating, if brief. You don’t really see an awful lot of the whale. Just it’s back, and the fluke — which I have since learned is what you call the forked tail. And it’s more a flashing image than a sustained moment.

But here’s the thing, the first, second, and even third sighting is wonderful. There’s something quite special that comes from knowing that a creature so huge and powerful exists — and that you’re right there, almost close enough to touch. By the time you get to your fourth whale, however, you begin to stop caring. I had forgotten the very serious downside of the trip: sea-sickness. After having seen a couple of whales, the majority of the formerly excited troop were lying supine on mats and cushions, fanning themselves with the pamphlets to fend off the nausea.

It happens, and there’s generally not much you can do about it.

However, whilst this is a downside, it shouldn’t be a deterrent. The intermittent moments between spewing your breakfast over the side of the boat when you do actually see the spray or fluke of a whale are breathtaking. These moments are rare and few. Much like the species itself. Blue whale hunting reached a peak in the 1960s, and what remains of the species today is estimated to be only around five percent of its original population. We were fortunate in that we actually saw quite a few. But once the novelty of actually seeing them had worn off, people became less excited.

But regardless of the generally waning enthusiasm, every time the boat raced towards a whale, there was definitely an excited little shiver that darted up my spine. It’s an experience, and a unique one at that. Just be prepared, and don’t expect too much. That way you’ll be happy.

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Citrus Hotel opens in Hikkaduwa

Citrus Hotel after a five month refurbishment, which began last May, opened last Saturday adding more value to Hikkaduwa. The hotel owned by Citrus Leisure PLC would add 90 ultra luxury rooms. Situated on a two acre free-hold property with an ideal view of the sea, Citrus Hikkaduwa offers the best in comfort and service and includes standard and executives rooms as well as a suite to suit the most discerning travellers.

The property will strategically be managed on a strict policy of cost versus benefit, with the stated purpose of doubling revenue by the end of the next financial year.

The company has stated a new vision of transforming itself into a chain of hotels, with ambitious plans to add 600 luxury rooms to Sri Lanka’s room inventory over the next three years.

The new management has unveiled accelerated growth plans and made several strategic acquisitions.

The first acquisition was a 7 acre land in Waskaduwa, at a sum of Rs. 221.7 million. Construction is scheduled to begin in early 2011 on a 150-roomed star class resort on the beach property.

Negotiations are also underway to acquire another plot of land on the East coast for a new beachfront resort.

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Discovering Sri Lanka

Going to Sri Lanka for the first time gave us an excuse to buy some new maps. That’s how our journeys always start. The journey we worked out took us straight from Colombo on the west coast up to the ancient sites of Dambulla and Polonnaruwa, in the centre of the island.

I’m a bad sight-seer – I find it too difficult to set what I’m seeing in any meaningful context. But we climbed the vertical face of the Lion Rock at Sigiriya. (Don’t ask how many steps there are before you start, or else you’ll never do it – its 200m high and there’s only one way to go. Straight up.)

We wandered through the ruins of the old royal capital at Polonnaruwa. But the sight I’m gladdest to have seen is Gal Vihara, where four monumental Buddhas (the biggest is 14m tall) are carved from a single rockface.

You don’t need to know ‘when’ or ‘how’ or ‘why’ to respond to these figures. In some part of your brain you appreciate the technical complexity of what you are looking at – the different coloured strata of the rock rippling smoothly through the faces and hands and robes of the Buddhas before morphing again into the jagged face of the cliff.

But technique isn’t the point. The serene calmness of the figures is what you remember, the smoothly rounded simplicity of their lines, their stillness and their ability to still those who stand in front of them.

We stitched in all the should-do stuff at the beginning of our journey. And then we started walking. Our first base was Rangala House, in the Knuckles Range east of Kandy, where Anthony Newman, who came to Kandy to head up a school, has settled for the duration. From the narrow road, you emerge through his house onto a verandah with a view that shimmers southwards seemingly forever. “Happiness is five horizons,” says an old Chinese proverb. Here, there were at least eight, with the waters of the Victoria Reservoir sparkling in the mid-ground.

There are just three rooms to let at Rangala House, where Newman’s Sri Lankan cook, Sebastian, gave us the best food we ate on our entire trip. Newman even had details of a good walk all written out, which is handy in a place where you can’t get hold of maps as detailed as our Ordnance Surveys. This is tea territory, of course, and his walk mostly took us through the sculpted, shining rows of tea bushes that swoop like contour lines round the slopes of the hills.

On the high ground, tea gives way to big forest trees, under-planted with sheaves of cardamom. The tea-pickers are mostly Tamils – Hindu rather than Buddhist – and during our walks over the next couple of weeks, we often passed their shrines, made by a spring or alongside a particularly old and splendid tree.

On this walk, there was a memorable one beneath a huge, buttressed Terminalia bellirica, three pointed stones, shawled in orange gauze under a shelter in the middle of nowhere. But the shrine was set high on a ridge, just at the point where you leave the views of one valley and embrace the vast panorama laid out before you in the next. The track eventually leads back down to the narrow road and a tea factory where a big, square pond is crammed with lotus and blue water lilies.

When we left Rangala, we doubled back to Kandy where we picked up a train at Peradeniya station. We rode this all the way to Talawakelle, the first of three train rides that gradually shifted us south and east towards Badulla where the line finishes. It’s best towards the end, where the tea country runs out and the train moves through spectacularly wild country, with tree ferns erupting between huge mounds of a red-flowered rhododendron.

When we went into tunnels, all the children on the train whooped and hollered and the noise ricocheted through the blackness: wawawawawawa. The stations are terrific. On the platform outside the District Engineer’s Upper Office at Nanu Oya is an enchanting balustraded garden with HT roses, asters and a pair of white plaster swans in a pool of water lilies.

Perhaps our best walk was from a bungalow at Bogawantalawa near Hatton. It started as an amble and turned into a magnificent five-hour climb, which, once again, ended at a Hindu shrine above a remote settlement of huts surrounded by immaculate vegetable gardens. Leeks, carrots, beetroot, cabbages and cauliflowers were all being grown in raised beds, knocked up on narrow terraces stolen from the hill.

First we crossed the river below the bungalow where, beyond the bridge, the road turns left for the Kirkoswald tea estate, right for Theresia. Then, keeping the distant settlement as our goal, we just followed tracks through the Theresia estate, past waterfalls and washing pools, past kingfishers and buzzards, past tea pickers and wood gatherers, past noisy packs of dogs and waving children. Huge African tulip trees (Spathodea campanulata) in vivid red bloom marked the rigid hierarchies of the imperial age: three trees in the garden of the manager’s bungalow, two for a superintendent, one for an assistant.

During our travels we stayed at seven different places. Our favourites were Lunuganga (which I wrote about just before Christmas), Rangala House, 92b Bobebilla Road, Makuldeniya, Nr Teldeniya, Central Province, rangalahouse.com, and Aerie Cottage, one of three bungalows to rent on the Kelburne Mountain View Estate, nr Haputale, kelburnemountainview.com. This estate is right at the southern edge of the hill country and has spectacular views down to the coast at Hambantota. Having made a plan, we handed the details to Red Dot Tours (reddottours.com) who booked everything (flights, accommodation, etc) and did a superb job.

Thanks: Independent

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Avani Hotels launches in Sri Lanka

Spa Business reports that Asian-based Minor Hotel Group (MHG) has unveiled a new luxury brand – complete with a signature in-house spa concept – for markets in Asia, Australia and the Middle East.

Avani Hotels & Resorts will be upscale and contemporary with a “simple sense of style”. Minor will offer the brand to third-party hotel operators, as well as looking for opportunities to own and operate sites itself.

The inaugural Avani has just opened in the south of Sri Lanka. The 75-bedroom Avani Bentota Resort and Spa – formerly known as Hotel Serendib Bentota – is owned by local hotel firm Serendib Leisure.

The resort has benefited from an extensive lkr650m (US$5.7m, €4.4m, £3.6m) refurbishment as part of a re-brand which has involved creating a more “modern and chic” ambiance.

Facilities include an Avani-branded spa with four treatment rooms – one of which is a double – and a sauna. Products are supplied by Sri Lanka-based brand, Spa Ceylon.

MHG CEO Dillip Rajakarier said: “With Sri Lanka poised for a boom in tourism, this well-appointed property will offer the experience that discerning travellers are seeking.”

It is the first of two properties announced by MHG under the new Avani brand, with the second due to open in Sri Lanka in 2012. ‘Avani’ comes from the Sanskrit word for ‘earth’.

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Post Office finds Sri Lanka holidays cheapest in 2012

Britons looking for winter sun will find their spending money going considerably further in Spain and Sri Lanka than the Caribbean or Australia; a cost comparison survey has showed.

A basket of typical holiday items, including drinks and suntan lotion, was less than £28 in Sri Lanka and just under £38 on Spain’s Costa del Sol, the survey by Post Office Travel Money found.

The same eight items, including a three-course evening meal for two, were as much as £113 in Barbados and £115.69 in the Australia city of Brisbane – the most expensive of the 40 destinations surveyed.

Other value-for-money destinations included Prague, where the eight items cost £39.57, Bulgaria (£39.65), Cancun in Mexico (£44.03) and Budapest (£45.57). In contrast, the items were as much as £113.03 in Singapore, £108.29 in Auckland and £108.07 in Costa Rica.

Post Office Travel Money said resort prices on the Costa del Sol were 40% lower than five years ago. It added that the pound was stronger against 29 major currencies than a year ago.

Although the pound is stronger against the Euro, the only Euro zone destination surveyed which showed a clear fall in resort costs was Cyprus – down 8%.

Turkey, once regarded as one of Europe’s cheapest destinations, is now 60% more expensive than Spain.

Post Office Travel Money head Sarah Munro said: “The message that came out clearly from our holiday budgeting research was that 2012 will be all about affordability. Holidays may still be a priority but they are not a necessity and people will not knowingly get into debt to fund them.

“That means that holidaymakers will be looking very carefully at their own finances before committing to a holiday and eagle-eyed in searching out trips that represent genuine good value.

“The winning destinations will be those that offer good value, not just for flights and accommodation, but for tourist staples like meals out and drinks.” – AP

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Sun City South Africa to invest $800m in Sri…

South Africa’s Sun City resort will invest $800 million in a tourism project in Sri Lanka, the head of the island nation’s state-run Tourism Board said on Friday.

Sun City resort is run by South African gaming and hotels group Sun International Ltd.

It will be the largest ever investment in the country’s leisure sector, which is booming since the end of a 25-year war.

“Sun City of South Africa is now going to make an $800 million investment in a 200-acre private property,” Nalaka Godahewa, head of the Tourism Board told Reuters in an interview.

The investment will be made on Sri Lanka’s hotel city in Katana, a coastal town located 15 km north of Colombo, he said.

“That decision is finalized. That is one of the biggest investments.”

Elanza Joubert, Sun City Resort’s deputy inventory manager at events and entertainment department, said in an e-mail response to Reuters questions that the company would not comment on the plan until the new year.

The government said in July it was expecting at least $1.5 billion in foreign investment in a proposed “tourist city” that includes four five-star hotels, shopping and a convention centre in Katana.

RECORD REVENUE & ARRIVALS

Sri Lanka has seen a remarkable rise in its post-war leisure industry with tourist arrivals expected hit a record 820,000 and revenue to rise to a record $800 million, jumping 25 percent and 39 percent from a year earlier, respectively.

“Next year, more than the number, we are concerned about the revenue. So the expectation is to hit $1 billion revenue and perhaps 950,000 arrivals,” Godahewa said.

He expects 1.3 million tourist arrivals in 2013 and 1.6 million in 2014, gradually reaching the country’s 2016 target of 2.5 million visitors with a target revenue of $1,000-$1,100 per tourist.

Godahewa also said the Tourism Board is seriously considering security issues after a British tourist was killed last week.

“We have asked the defence authorities and all the security establishments to be supportive in protecting tourists as it is going to be a $1 billion industry.”

In January Sri Lanka signed agreements with Hong Kong-based Shangri La Asia for a $500 million complex with high-end retail facilities, deluxe apartments and a 500-room luxury hotel in Colombo and a 300-room city resort on approximately 100 acres in Hambantota on the southern coast. – Reuters

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