Mossel Bay’s Happy Easter Mossel Bay’s tourism industry is holding its own - with some businesses reporting increased occupancy despite the general economic slow down.General manager of the town’s Diaz Strand Hotel and Resort, Timon Jansonius, said that, although final figures were not yet available, his hotel’s occupancy was, “Between 10 and 15% up on last Easter.“I think our results are due to the increased awareness of Mossel Bay as a destination of choice, and, of course, the weather helped, too - but I think we definitely underestimated this season,” he said.Mr. Jansonius, who serves both on the board of Mossel Bay Tourism and on its marketing committee, said that the general feeling was that the town was, “Very busy, with the self-catering resorts particularly reporting very high occupancies.”Danette Histerman, of Bonniedale, an adventure farm with self-catering, guest house and camping facilities in the mountains between Mossel Bay and Oudtshoorn, said that, “This was our best Easter ever - and our guests were the nicest people!“We were turning people away from our self-catering units, and we had to create extra campsites to accommodate the demand from campers.”She said, however, that she’d noticed that trends were changing. “We had no overseas visitors this Easter - they were all South Africans - and people were looking to downgrade.“What’s fantastic, though, is that we’re seeing more and more young people coming back to hiking.“People in general are going back to nature.”JJ Moorcroft, owner of the Protea Hotel Mossel Bay, said that his property was, “Full and the restaurant (Café Gannet) was humming,” while Janine Shippen, who assists in the restaurant and also runs SRT Premium Functions, said that, “Our overall turnover per day was similar to what we experienced over the summer season - and this summer was better than last year.”She said that her functions business had had, “A really busy weekend, but I can’t really compare it with last Easter because we’ve only been going for two years now. But we do know that this is a good time for weddings in the Garden Route, and that there were a lot of them this year.“We put this down to the cost of travelling these days - people seem to want to combine taking a few days off with going to a wedding rather than making a special trip.”Owner of The Point Hotel, Louis Harris, said that they’d had, “A good season so far.“When times are tough like this, you have to hope that you’ve invested in the right kind of marketing over the years - and I think we have done the right things, which is why Mossel Bay is proving resilient.”
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