Cape Town - According to South African Tourism’s recent study, barriers to domestic travel were first and foremost affordability (27 percent) and transport infrastructure and cost (19 percent).
With our shrinking disposable incomes caused by the overall performance of our country’s economy, it seems that most local travellers are opting for the more financially viable “staycation”.
With this in mind, Avios, the travel rewards programme, took to Facebook ahead of the 2015 December holiday break, to ask their followers - approximately 53 000 travel-loving South African’s between the ages of 18 and 65 – if they formed part of this staycation trend or if they were lucky enough to be travelling over December.
Consumers were also asked which destinations they would place on their travel bucket list, if they had an opportunity to visit each of our beautiful provinces, in addition to which of the six surrounding countries would they most like to visit.
Some of the highlighted results can be found below:
Forty-two percent of respondents did not travel anywhere over the festive season, while 36 percent headed to our countries coastline to enjoy beautiful beaches.
A small percentage (seven percent) noted that they were off to experience the extreme heat of the bush over the December holiday, while four percent opted to travel to colder destinations dusted with snow.
Eleven percent of survey respondents were lucky enough to travel overseas. Jerusalem, Israel, New Zealand, Scotland and England were the international holiday destinations of choice for these particular respondents.
Beautiful landscapes such as Table Mountain (35 percent), Boulders Beach (21 percent) and Camps Bay (18 percent) were the top three destinations people would like to visit if they were given the chance to visit the Western Cape.
Similarly, Eastern Cape’s destination of choice was the Hole in the Wall (37 percent) and Northern Cape’s beautifully famous Augrabies Falls and Namaqualand caught the interest of 29 percent of travel enthusiasts.
Interestingly, the most highlighted destinations in Johannesburg, were Gold Reef City (39 percent), the Lion Park (17 percent) and the Cradle of Humankind (16 percent).
In KwaZulu Natal, the Drakensburg topped the list with 38 percent of respondents’ votes, while Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Nature Reserve and Umhlanga came tie in second position with 23 percent.
Mpumalanga, Free State and the North West province all seemed to be famous for their nature reserves, highlighting Kruger National Park, Golden Gate Highlands National Park and the Pilansberg Game Reserve with 41 percent, 36 percent and 40 percent respectively.
If given the opportunity to go to Limpopo, 29 percent of respondents chose Bela Bela (Warm Baths) and the Waterberg Biosphere Reserve as their favourite places to go, closely followed by Modjaji’s Forest (21percent).
Out of the six neighbouring countries, Mozambique and Namibia were the most alluring holiday destinations, according to 25 percent and 19 percent of respondents respectively.
To find out more about Avios, the travel rewards programme, or to become a member go to www.avios.com.
IOL, adapted from a press release.