‘Covid tourism’: Mt Abu sold out on weekends

JAIPUR: Try booking any hotel or resort in Mount Abu on weekends, the answer is invariably going to be, “It’s sold out.”
The local hospitality industry calls it “Covid tourism”. Continuous rains over the past one month, misty mountains, gurgling streams and water falls are just the cherry on the cake.
Till June, the hill station was in green category, but isolated cases started since then and went almost unnoticed. Mount Abu has so far reported 54 cases out of which 15 are active now.
Being a four-hour drive from Ahmedabad, Mount Abu is a popular among for Gujaratis, as it also serving as a watering hole for the liquor-starved neighbours. As borders opened after the lockdown, they were the first ones to arrive. But the rush begun from August.
“We lost the summer rush to the pandemic. In July, travellers were tentative … As rains came in August, it opened the floodgates of cooped up tourists. Now, the destination is a full house on weekends,” said Kashyap Jani, former president of Mount Abu Hotel Association.
He said while Gujaratis traditionally account for 80-90% of tourists, people from nearby cities like Udaipur, Jodhpur and Jaipur are also thronging the destination.
“It’s been too long a confined life, depression is not far away. With almost negligible coronavirus cases, Mount Abu is safer than my place,” said Heeral Mehta from Ahmedabad, who along with his family spent the last weekend in the hill station.
The rates charged by hotels are as high as pre-Covid days, but Jani said, the weekday rates are cheaper by about 50%. With occupancy during weekdays rising from 10-15% a month back to about 40% now, rates are also rising proportionately.
District collector Bhagwati Prasad said, “We are not worried about the rush, but the administration is strictly monitoring adherence of SOPs by hotels and visitors.” It’s hard to guess how long the hill station can remain as an oasis in the Covid world.