Himalayan Holidays Trekking Pvt. Ltd, in cooperation with “FlyDubai” Airlines, had organized a ‘FAM’ (Familiarization) trip to Nepal for prominent tour and travel operators and agencies from Central Russia in February, 2015. It was one of the first-of-its-kind FAM trips for travel specialists from Russia to this beautiful Himalayan country. However, Nepal is yet to gain popularity as a destination for the up-market and luxury segment of tourism as the country is mainly for adventure enthusiast and thrill seekers, who visit here not for lying down on a sandy beach and taking it easy. Therefore, Nepal continues to remain ‘non-existent’ on the global map of luxury travel industry.
The FAM trip participants hadn’t reached the Himalayas, the very trademark of this country, but viewed them from the hills of Pokhara 16~18 kilometers away! We visited Kathmandu, Pokhara, Lumbini and Chitwan and all guests enjoyed the visit and took back fond memories and impressions about Nepal.
The earthquakes of April 25 and May 12 that struck central Nepal ‘pulled the carpet’ from under the feet of not only Nepalis, but also from the people all over the world who were preparing to visit here.The international media carried shocking videos of the dead, injured, destruction and the panic that followed the quakes.
Disorder ensued in the country's only international airport Tribhuvan International Airport during the first few days. Flights in and out of the country were cancelled or delayed. By the time the airport resumed its operations, the world had already heard the frightening news and watched scenes of panic, deaths and devastation on television and internet. Tourists began cancelling their bookings on a massive scale. During the one and a half week that followed the aftermath, 90 percent travel bookings for late spring, summer and fall were cancelled or postponed.
Air companies also couldn’t comment nor forecast about their schedule and confirm tickets that were already booked and paid for. Situation got from bad to worse, because it was almost impossible to communicate with Nepali travel companies and not only because of lack of mobile and Internet connections in Kathmandu, but also because of the agency employees’ fear to enter offices/buildings.
From the snippets of information travelers got, a lot of UNESCO heritage sites were destroyed or hit hard. Normally, a travel itinerary to Kathmandu valley, which takes 2-3 days, now appeared to hang in the balance. Meanwhile, the condition of the remote areas and trekking routes remained unknown.
Few days to mid-May, when Nepal government was just telling the world that Nepal is safe for travelling, the second earthquake struck, corroborating opinion that it is unsafe in Nepal. Even proven thrill seekers changed their mind and cancelled their trips. Destruction of the road from Kathmandu to Tibet made the way to Lhasa and to Mount Kailash very expensive as the only access remaining now was via flight into Lhasa.
Leaving all that in the recent past and with normalcy back in place, the need of the hour is to regain the confidence of the international travelers to visit Nepal. As the main attractive tourist activities in Nepal are trekking, mountaineering, rafting, wildlife jungle safari, mountain biking, among others, combined with cultural tour highlighting the native culture and traditions of the peace loving Nepalis, it is time to put our acts together and move ahead with full determination to restart the promotion of Nepal in the international arena.
For this scribe, Russia being an important market, we would like to draw the attention of concerned authorities in Nepal that at the moment the adventure vacations are not so popular with the Russian people, who can afford trips to South Asia; they rather opt for holidaying on the beaches of Goa, Bali or Thailand.
During our February FAM trip to Nepal together with travel specialists from Russia, we arrived at the conclusion that Nepal may become popular as cultural and sightseeing destination for Russian people as the country has great potential in this respect.
Before the recent earthquakes, only 5 percent of the Russian population knew about Nepal. The disaster increased that to about 10 percent. However, this population views Nepal as a dangerous destination given the way the country came into their light. Moreover, such defamatory slogan by media as “Help Nepal - Visit Nepal” has further conveyed the message that Nepal is not ready to host tourists.
Yet, as Nepal puts efforts to convince tourists from around the world that the country is safe to visit, this time also provides opportunity to promote the country as tourism destination in those countries whose citizens have little knowledge and awareness about Nepal’s tourism value.
In case of Russia, adventure and cultural tourism could be two areas which might interest Russian tourists, and the government of Nepal and other concerned stakeholders should focus on devising strategies to effectively inform them about Nepal’s cultures and adventure prospects.
It’s worthwhile to inform Russian people about Nepal’s rich history, religion, culture, people, cuisine and beautiful landscapes. Only little proportion of Russians know about the historically and culturally affluent Kathmandu Valley and Lumbini, the birth place of Gautam Buddha, for instance. Once informed about Nepal, however, many of them could put Nepal on their top destination list.
Mass media like television shows, articles in magazines, websites could be strategically used to spread information about Nepal among the Russian citizens.
Likewise, the range of tallest mountains on Earth, the Himalayas and the trekking trails that pass through picturesque hills and landscapes which takes the travelers very close to the snowy mountains make Nepal a destination for adventure tourism that no other place can offer. Adventure in Nepal brings enthusiasm and real happiness to the visitors.
The rich flora and fauna of the Chitwan National Park and dozen other national parks and wildlife reserves and picturesque places like Pokhara add to Nepal’s majestic beauty. Tourists who visit Nepal will definitely find themselves in a bright, impressive, memorable Asia. In fact, adventure begins when person decides to go next time off the beaten track – to Nepal.
One reason which has augmented less foreign visitors to Nepal is a lack of direct flights from Europe. The way to Kathmandu are limited to connecting flights via United Arab Emirates (Dubai, Sharjah, Abu-Dhabi), Turkey (Istanbul), Qatar (Doha) and Thailand (Bangkok) only.
It looks like that Nepal’s fame as a mountain country, land of mystery mostly brings thrill seeker, who mostly come to trek to high hills and mountains. Other categories of tourists, who come to Nepal are travelling hippies who stay in cities like Kathmandu and Pokhara and spend 10-20 dollars a day, sightseeing tourist, who get here by air or ground from India. A small category comprises affluent travelers.
The earthquakes cut off mainly the tourist traffic (if the amount Nepal had we may call “traffic”), mainly in case of sightseeing tourists, affluent travelers and halved thrill seekers.
The government of Nepal could adopt following measures to attract these tourists back:
The first priority for the government should be to coordinate with the embassies in Kathmandu and issue press releases to inform that Nepal is safe. The first and the last official press release was issued on May 13, a day after the second strong earthquake struck.
All the travel and tour operators and agents who participated in the FAM trip in February 2015 demanded official assurances regarding safety for their customers in Nepal. Given the lack of the direct news and information from Nepal in Russia, people need at least official letters. By providing this, we may attract a good share of sightseeing and thrill seeking tourists.
Having provided the safety assurance, the next step has to be large scale campaign for promotion of Nepal as travel destination. As I mentioned above, press trips with articles, photo exhibitions showing culture and nature of Nepal, documentary films, promo clips could be ways of doing so. The government should lead such a campaign and facilitate access of travel writers, shooting groups and other related people to national parks and other tourist destinations, for example to make the required promotion materials.
Nepal must organize arts and crafts exhibitions, photo exhibitions, various festival ceremonies, culutural lectures and seminars and other similar events for further promotion of the country.
Taking all the aforesaid into consideration, I would like to say that in spite of all the problems marring Nepal after the recent disasters, it will rise again for sure and there is always a possibility that in a short time Nepal will reach a greater height in tourism than before. Foreign tourists will once again prefer Nepal to spend their vacation. The UNESCO Heritage sites will be shining again. All we need to do is to take some small steps every day, to do some small things for safety, joy and happiness of the visitors, who want to experience the hospitality of the Nepali people, witness the ancient cultures and touch the greatest mountains in the world!
(Myasnikov is the Regional representative of Himalayan Holidays Nepal in Russia, which works to promote Nepal in Russia in coordination with the embassies, international organizations, travel operators and agencies)
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