More tourists, few rooms

Organizers said Kadayawan Festival was able to attract a lot of tourists but hotels and accommodations were not able to cater to all of them.

The Kadayawan festival has attracted a lot of tourists from all over the world compared to last year’s as what has been observed by the event’s organizers.

Although they could not provide a number of tourists who went and observed in the celebration, festival director Gatchi Gatchalian considered the huge influx of tourists as the reason for the difficulty in accommodating all the guests and visitors.

“Mas marami ang turista this year compared to last year. Puno ang mga hotels, kulang ang mga hotels natin to accommodate more (We have more tourists this year than last year. Hotels are fully-booked [and] our hotels cannot accommodate more),” Gatchalian said during a press conference at SM City’s Kapehan yesterday.

“Actually, yung ating ibang mga bisita ay kailangan ilipat ng ibang hotel para ma-accommodate (Actually, some of our visitors were transferred to other hotels in order to accommodate them),” he added.

Meanwhile, Gatchalian said that they are hopeful that the problem will be resolved since more hotels will open in Davao City this year and next year.

Overall, he said that Kadayawan ended successfully with the help of Dabawenyos, private sectors, tourists and the media.

“This is really a collaborative effort,” he said, adding that Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio would like to personally thank everyone on a Pasalamat event which will be announced soon.

Some activities of the Kadayawan such as sports events and the agri-trade fair are still going on until the end of the month.