40% jump in bookings: Mumbaiites to take off for mini vacations

According to travel operators, flight and hotel bookings this Easter — starting from Thursday (April 2 being a public holiday on account of Mahavir Jayanti) — rose by more than 40% over the same period last year.

Scores of people are set to take off for a mini vacation away from Mumbai this forthcoming Easter weekend.

This is in keeping with the emerging trend of quick getaways witnessed on long weekends this year.

According to travel operators, flight and hotel bookings this Easter — starting from Thursday (April 2 being a public holiday on account of Mahavir Jayanti) — rose by more than 40% over the same period last year.

“The upcoming Easter break is yet another excuse for Mumbaiites to take off on an extended getaway. We saw a 39% jump in bookings for Easter in 2015, as compared to the same weekend last year. There was a 12% jump in bookings compared to a non-holiday weekend in March 2015,” said Amit Taneja, chief revenue officer with travel portal Cleartrip.

Some travel companies said the upcoming weekend saw the highest increase in travel movement as compared to the pervious long weekends such as the Republic Day weekend in January and the Holi weekend last month.

“The number of bookings and queries has increased by 43% from last year’s 30%. For the Republic Day and Holi weekends, we had seen a 30-33% surge in travel,” said Vikram Malhi, managing director, Expedia (Asia).

Drive-away destinations were the most popular, added operators.

“Travellers from Mumbai chose Goa, Lucknow, and New Delhi the most,” said Jackson Fernandez, managing director with Wego (India), another travel portal.

A small section of luxury travellers rented high-end cars for self-drive tours this weekend.

“Bookings have grown over 20x from last Easter,” said Greg Moran, co-founder and chief executive officer Zoomcar, a self-drive car rental company.