The Sunshine Coast is bracing for a summer of “revenge tourism” as Queensland’s borders re-open — but don’t worry, it’s a good thing.
After being trapped for months in NSW and Victoria — and in many cases locked indoors — southern visitors are expected to storm into the Coast to indulge in a summer full of experiences.
“They’ve been cooped up and there’ll be all this pent up energy and and they’ll be coming up here for Christmas and spending two weeks going to places like the zoo and getting photos with giraffes and food tours,” Visit Sunshine Coast’s Andrew Fairburn told sunshinecoastnews.com.au
“You could call it revenge tourism. Instead of spending $10,000 on airfares and accommodation going to Spain, they’re spending money here having these experiences like cooking classes, helicopter tours and plane flights.”
However, with many accommodation places already booked out with Queensland visitors – or getting close – the question is whether there will be many rooms left at the inn for the eager interstate travellers.
Big-spending southerners finally received the news this week they would be allowed back into Queensland when Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announced the state was “good to go” for residents of NSW and Victoria from December 1.
The anticipated announcement came after Victoria recorded 28 days without an unlinked case of community coronavirus transmission.
“So that’s absolutely wonderful news, congratulations to Daniel Andrews and his team down there, and to all of the Victorians, and we look forward to welcoming you to Queensland,” said Ms Palaszczuk.
“And please stop by and say hello. If you see me out and about during the holidays because it’s going to be wonderful.”
Qantas has already announced it will resume flights to the Sunshine Coast from Melbourne and Sydney, with 12 Jetstar and five Qantas connections to Sydney and 15 Jetstar and seven Qantas flights to Melbourne.
Sunshine Coast Airport CEO Andrew Brodie said the airport was working with airlines to finalise schedules and expected the number of flights to increase four-fold in the coming month.
Mr Brodie said every aircraft arriving delivered $50,000 tourism spend directly into the region.
Sydney and Melbourne are the Sunshine Coast’s “bread and butter” for domestic flying visitors.
Mr Fairbairn said the borders re-opening was “the biggest news in tourism”.
He said NSW and Victorian tourists were considered “high value” travellers because they tended to stay longer — for five to six days compared to visitors from within a few hours drive who typically came just on weekends.
Interstate tourists also spent more as they indulged in eating out for every meal (rather than buying food at the supermarket), visiting paid attractions and booking fun experiences.
For much of the pandemic, the Sunshine Coast’s 320 accommodation houses have been practically booked out every weekend with mostly Queensland holidaymakers but have had rooms available during the week.
That is expected to change once December 1 rolls by and southerners can either commit to their bookings, often made a year earlier, or plan a new holiday to the Coast.
“There are a lot of diehard Victorians and Sydney people who would already have their bookings and were waiting to find out what was happening,” Mr Fairbairn said.
Tracey Harris, from the Caloundra Holiday Centre, said that as soon as the border announcement was made she was fielding calls from people in NSW and Victoria wanting to come to the Sunshine Coast.
“Because we are quite full until Christmas and New Year there was not much we could do in that regard, but we did make some bookings for later January and February and I’m sure it will continue,” Ms Harris said.
Caloundra Holiday Centre manages about 150 properties, mostly around Kings Beach but including areas like Currimundi and Pelican Waters, and Ms Harris said bookings in September and October were the highest in her 34 years.
There are currently only 10 properties available so Ms Harris urged people to get in quick.
Belaire Place manager Ron Flynn, at Bulcock Beach Caloundra, said bookings in the pandemic had been constant, but the main difference was people opting for “short sharp” stays rather than long breaks.
“We’ve been full from the get-go; it’s been very busy,” Mr Flynn said.
Belaire Place is already about 80 per cent booked until early January and some of the bookings were returning NSW guests from last year.
“Last year we had guests staying longer from New Zealand, Tasmania, Victoria so we have missed that but we picked up a lot of local visitors from the Gold Coast, Brisbane, Bundaberg and Toowoomba,” he said.
Mr Brodie, from Sunshine Coast Airport, said more capacity from down south would “give our hospitality and tourism industry a better Christmas”.
“The announcement is also so important for families to be reconnected at this time, after many months of border closures so I am sure we will see plenty of hugs, love and tears this time next week here at the Airport,” he said.
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In the event of another interstate outbreak, Ms Palaszczuk said Queensland would impose restrictions on a specific geographical area under a hotspot regime.
However Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young said there were no set parameters for the new hotspot regime.
“Each particular case has got to be looked at on its merits and work out what the risk is to Queensland,” she said.
Ms Palaszczuk stressed every state’s hotel quarantine program needed to be rock solid to protect the community from outbreaks.
She called upon the federal government to be extremely careful when considering any changes to the country’s international borders.
“Australia is doing a great job, let’s get Australia to stay on course, let’s open up Australia for Australia,” she told Sunrise.
“But there is real danger in taking back into Australia too many overseas international arrivals if our quarantine systems cannot cope. I cannot be clearer on that.”
-with AAP
