Hurray, hurray, it’s a Holiday Inn
THE world’s largest Holiday Inn is to be built in Makkah, Saudi Arabia, in 2016. The 1 238-room Holiday Inn Makkah, a joint venture between the InterContinental Hotels Group and Makkah Real Estate Company, is being built as a result of the boom in religious tourism to Saudi Arabia.
More than 3-million pilgrims took part in the Hajj in 2012, 8% more than the year before, and more than half of all inbound tourists to the kingdom throughout the year travel to the religious cities of Makkah and Medinah.
Total tourist numbers to Saudi Arabia are expected to top 15.8-million by 2014.
This will be the first Holiday Inn on the Pilgrimage route.
Currently, the world’s biggest is the 1 224-room Holiday Inn Macao Cotai Central in Macau, China.
KATHMANDU’S RUNWAY CRACKED
NEPAL has urged airlines flying into the capital of Kathmandu to use smaller aircraft after cracks appeared in the runway at the city’s Tribhuvan International Airport.
According to The Telegraph, 26 international airlines were warned about safety concerns at the airport after sections of the 3 000m runway’s surface separated, leaving small holes.
This is not the first time the airport has made the news. In June 2011, a section of the runway subsided following monsoon rains, the result, experts said at the time, of the underlying soil stability being threatened by the rivers and waterways around the airport.
TOURISTS FLEE FIRES
A LARGE wildfire near California’s popular Yosemite National Park closed the road to the park last week and sent tourists fleeing, Travelmole reports. While the park remained open, the massive fire — which was being fought by 1 300 firefighters — shut the highway to one of Yosemite’s western entrances.
Yosemite receives up to 15 000 visitors a day in the summer.
The fire was one of 50 burning in the western US. Another five wildfires scorched large tracts of Yellowstone National Park.
EGYPT UPRISING RATTLES SINAI
HOLIDAYMAKERS near the Sinai Peninsula town of Sharm el-Sheikh have been moved to new accommodation following fears that Egyptian authorities could close the road, segregating tourists from the rest of the country, The Telegraph reports.
Tour operator Nomadic Thoughts said it had moved its clients into the resort town from outlying areas after fearing that demonstrations in Cairo and elsewhere could escalate and affect the rest of the country.
There were rumours that the Egyptian authorities might close the road between Sharm el-Sheikh and other resort towns such as Dahab and Nuweiba.
Holidaymakers in Sharm were already subject to a night-time curfew last week, the paper reports, while excursions to popular attractions such as St Catherine’s Monastery have been dropped.
BRIGHTON BLOWS
A POLL has slammed the British seaside town of Brighton for trying “too hard to be cool”, The Telegraph reports. Tourists polled by travel website Real Holiday Reports said the town was “full of bohemians and bad art”, bad parking and garishly dressed clubbers, among other criticisms. The poll ranked the town Britain’s worst holiday resort. Blackpool came in second-worst, followed by Skegness and Scarborough.