Making a Splash this season
Into its fifth year now, Splash has helped in positioning Wayanad as a monsoon destination in both the domestic and international tourism circuits.
During the nine- day programme, WTO will offer both indoor and outdoor activities for tourists. The outdoor activities will include country rafting, paddy-transplantation, crab-tours, local archery, elephant ride, slush ploughing, slush football, volley ball, rain biking, shopping wherein it offers local artifacts, souvenirs, SHG stalls and tribal food stalls. While for the indoor activities, it will organise a photo exhibition on the monsoons in Wayanad, Ayurvedic rejuvenation programme and seminars on coffee, tea, spices, value-addition of local spices, organic farming and tribal protection.
Into its fifth year now, Splash has helped in positioning Wayanad as a mon- soon destination in both the domestic and international tourism circuits. Giving more details about the event, K Ravindran, Coordinator, Splash 2013 says, “Designed to offer the local flavour of the destination to the travellers, the event this year will be organised from July 12- 14 in Wayanad. The focus of this year’s programme will be the ‘ Business To Business’ meet ( B2B) in which more than 400 travel agents across the nation are expected to interact with the property owners. We are happy to say that almost 350 travel agents have already registered for the business-meet.”
Talking about earlier days, Ravindran reminisces, “In 2005, Kerala Tourism first started talking about the glory of ‘ when the heavens touch the earth’. This was the state’s first initiative towards promoting itself as a monsoon destination.” Regarding the promotion of the project outside Kerala and its future strategies, he informs, “We will promote the programme aggressively at the road shows organised by Kerala Tourism. We will also launch this programme in several places such as Chennai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Surat, Mumbai, Nagpur, Kolkata, Delhi and Pune later.” While
most travellers would typically skip India during the monsoons, the states are now gearing up to tap this segment by promoting the unique thrills offered by this Indian season. After aggressively promoting its backwaters and houseboats, Kerala is now promoting its tourist spots as a 365- day destination. Betting big on monsoon tourism in the State, it is expecting to boost footfalls to the lesser-known destinations. The Wayanad monsoon carnival- Splash is an example of the joint efforts of the state government and Wayanad Tourism Organisation ( WTO). On the lines of the Samba Carnival in Brazil, the monsoon tourism project was first held in 2009. This has now become a regular annual feature which leads to a get- together of travellers, tourism writers and entrepreneurs, who share their joy and concern over nature and tourism.