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Bookings for tours to the Dudhsagar waterfalls have been made hassle-free with the introduction online booking facility. The decision was taken considering the demand from tourists as well as the state government, announced Tribolo Souza, president of Dudhsagar Tour Operators Association at a press briefing at Ponda on Tuesday.

With this service, tourists will not have to rush to Collem early to book a jeep, which was earlier working on a first-cum-first-serve basis. Many tourists were missing out on the opportunity to venture in the forest and were forced to return back due to restriction on the number of trips per day. But now tourists will have feasibility to book a jeep in accordance to their arrival time, said Tribolo Souza.

It may be noted that though there are over 400 jeeps registered for Dudhsagar tour service, only 300 are allowed to venture into the forest per day.

Around 100 jeeps are made available for online booking between the time slots of 8 am to 11 pm on the website www.ticketpapa.com, informed Souza. From its launching on October 18, almost 4,400 tourists have booked their trips online of which 3700 were domestic tourists while around 700 were foreign tourists.

He further stated that in the coming days, more jeeps will be made available for online booking, which can be booked with nominal fees of Rs 60 and tourists will have to pay main amount for jeep tour after they avail the service. A jeep ferries around 7 passengers at a time at a cost of Rs 3500 per trip.

Since the beginning of tourism season on October 2, around 29,000 domestic tourists and around 2100 foreign tourists have ventured to the Dudhsagar waterfall by jeeps, informed Souza.