In our childhood days, most of the people in India travel predominantly for two purpose : families that travel on vacation, which typically but not always take them back to an ancestral home, a nearby hill station or pilgrims visiting various temples and shrines all year round. Leisure trips to exotic destinations were reserved to uber riches which could be counted easily on figure tips. And yes, going for holy bath in Ganga at Haridwar, Garh, Allahabad, Varanasi is a very old tradition. Visit to Nashik, Ujjain, Haridwar, Allahabad during Kumbh or Ardh Kumbh is a age old tradition in our country.
But the agenda for leisure vacationers was very limited, when they ventured to a new place was one of brutal simplicity: cover as much ground as possible in as little time as possible, stopping only for the mandatory family photo, against a famous landmark. Pilgrims may have started with little other than god on their minds, but over the years, they've wanted their personal time with the deity to be a lot quicker and hassle free.
Around these broad categories though, are a whole range of Indians traveling for a variety of reasons. Things have changed very fast during last fifteen years or so. There are techies, software warriors who keep on moving frequently from one part of globe to the other to fix bugs or on site call , in the process they also enjoy some days in leisurely mood. But surely over the year with disposable income shot up people travel for so many other reasons and different kind of tourist category emerged.
I was in Scotland last summer and was enjoying my one week stay in its historical town of Edinburgh. This city is very famous for dark tours. Robert Louis Stevenson , one of Edinburgh’s most famous literary figures wrote about these tours, ‘Only a few inches separate the living from the dead.’ And nowhere is that more true than in the Old Edinburgh Town. From Burke and Hare to Half-Hangit Maggie , the city has more than its fair share of murderers, ghosts, haunted locations and downright scare-you-senseless stories. There are certain parts of city that inspired classics such as The Strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde from the catacomb of hidden vaults and chambers beneath the South Bridge to Greyfriars Kirkyard, after which you’ll be glad that there are a number of nearby pubs in which to steady your shattered nerves with a stiff drink.
In another tour called Edinburgh Dungeon, 500 years of the capital’s dark history are crammed into one very scary space and delivered by a team of actors and spine-tingling special effects. Aimed at the whole family, the attractions include two heart-in-the-mouth rides: the Drop Ride to Doom and a boat trip into the blood-spattered cave of cannibal Sawney Bean. Piling on the tales of witches’ persecution, body-snatching and local superstition are Auld Reekie Tours , one of several operating in Edinburgh. As well as visiting the vaults under the High Street, this tour has a grisly torture museum, tells tales of the Niddrie Wynd poltergeist and ends up in Nicol Edwards’ pub, reputed to be the most haunted in Scotland – the spirits don’t promise to stay in your glass.
At the Real Mary King's Close , you’ll see a historically accurate interpretation of life in Edinburgh from the 16th to the 19th centuries, focusing on the closes under the Royal Mile. Visitors are guided by one of the ‘characters’ who lived in this time capsule of four closes with real rooms and streets that date back to the 1600s. Dramatic episodes and extraordinary apparitions from the past are revealed, including hair-raising ghost stories over 300 years old.
Another operator The Cadies and Witchery will tour you around with lighthearted look at witchcraft, plague and torture focuses on the Royal Mile's ghostly goings-on and have been scaring people around the Old Town for two decades.
In another tour called Edinburgh Dungeon, 500 years of the capital’s dark history are crammed into one very scary space and delivered by a team of actors and spine-tingling special effects. Aimed at the whole family, the attractions include two heart-in-the-mouth rides: the Drop Ride to Doom and a boat trip into the blood-spattered cave of cannibal Sawney Bean. Piling on the tales of witches’ persecution, body-snatching and local superstition are Auld Reekie Tours , one of several operating in Edinburgh. As well as visiting the vaults under the High Street, this tour has a grisly torture museum, tells tales of the Niddrie Wynd poltergeist and ends up in Nicol Edwards’ pub, reputed to be the most haunted in Scotland – the spirits don’t promise to stay in your glass.
At the Real Mary King's Close , you’ll see a historically accurate interpretation of life in Edinburgh from the 16th to the 19th centuries, focusing on the closes under the Royal Mile. Visitors are guided by one of the ‘characters’ who lived in this time capsule of four closes with real rooms and streets that date back to the 1600s. Dramatic episodes and extraordinary apparitions from the past are revealed, including hair-raising ghost stories over 300 years old.
Another operator The Cadies and Witchery will tour you around with lighthearted look at witchcraft, plague and torture focuses on the Royal Mile's ghostly goings-on and have been scaring people around the Old Town for two decades.
In the same trip I also visited London. In the city's artistic East End district, I took a grisly tour that takes the tourists, those with a taste for gore and guts, through the stomping grounds of Jack the Ripper. Certified Ripperologists, , take the iron willed and hearted on a trip to check out the victims, crime scenes, the evidence and the cobbled streets where the Ripper once walked and murdered. In Switzerland, on the former country estate of the Chaplin family, in Corsier-sur-Vevey, a whole new world around the man with the bowler hat is due to open soon, and the tour would include a peep into the private life of the great comedian along with a showcase of his artistic works. The itineraries on most tourist-companies reel is morphing to newer forms and including things which would have been considered eccentric a while ago.
In our country Jaipur has also become a hot destination to foreigners, flocking to its forts and palaces, there are many whose annual pilgrimage to the Pink City is principally to be a part of the now iconic Jaipur Literature Festival that claims to be the world's largest free literary festival. It attracts enthusiasts from all over the globe. In the recent years Kochi also developed as culture destination due to its Muziris Biennale, launched in 2012. It attracts hordes of aficionados from all over the globe to join in. The Biennale hopes to position Kochi as a repository of emerging ideas and ideologies. Sulafest, the wine-festival that is in its 9th edition, has made a destination of the Sula Vineyards, near the city of Nashik, thanks to its growing popularity. An event that started off small has now become a premier festival with its mix of wine, food, music and stand-up acts.
The big driver for the new age traveler, across the globe and India as well, is the ability to create and curate experience suited to one's own preference and taste. While a large majority travels for obvious reasons, there is a silent minority, growing in numbers, which has got their own motivations to visit places that can range from films to art to literature and many more. London & Partners, the official promotional company for London, funded by the Mayor of London, has launched its latest tourism campaign for the city, 'Fans of London'. Shares Tori Dance, head of tourism, London & Partners, "the campaign seeks to celebrate the blockbuster events, exhibitions and anniversaries taking place across the capital this year." The highlights include: the Queen's 90th birthday, the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's legacy and the world's first Rolling Stones exhibition.
In our country Jaipur has also become a hot destination to foreigners, flocking to its forts and palaces, there are many whose annual pilgrimage to the Pink City is principally to be a part of the now iconic Jaipur Literature Festival that claims to be the world's largest free literary festival. It attracts enthusiasts from all over the globe. In the recent years Kochi also developed as culture destination due to its Muziris Biennale, launched in 2012. It attracts hordes of aficionados from all over the globe to join in. The Biennale hopes to position Kochi as a repository of emerging ideas and ideologies. Sulafest, the wine-festival that is in its 9th edition, has made a destination of the Sula Vineyards, near the city of Nashik, thanks to its growing popularity. An event that started off small has now become a premier festival with its mix of wine, food, music and stand-up acts.
The big driver for the new age traveler, across the globe and India as well, is the ability to create and curate experience suited to one's own preference and taste. While a large majority travels for obvious reasons, there is a silent minority, growing in numbers, which has got their own motivations to visit places that can range from films to art to literature and many more. London & Partners, the official promotional company for London, funded by the Mayor of London, has launched its latest tourism campaign for the city, 'Fans of London'. Shares Tori Dance, head of tourism, London & Partners, "the campaign seeks to celebrate the blockbuster events, exhibitions and anniversaries taking place across the capital this year." The highlights include: the Queen's 90th birthday, the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's legacy and the world's first Rolling Stones exhibition.
Most of such events have huge draw. This new breed of culture venturer has a unique hunger to sample varied cultures from across the world.
Dare Devil Tourists
It is new kind of tourist breed. Their interests range from visiting war zones, slums, spotting snow leopards.
Dare Devil Tourists
It is new kind of tourist breed. Their interests range from visiting war zones, slums, spotting snow leopards.
CNN has recently done a lead story about a man Andrew Drury who dodged Russian soldiers in the bombed out ruins of Chechnya, infiltrated a Ku Klux Klan militia, played golf in Pyongyang and stayed with a former headhunting tribe in Myanmar. 50 year old Andrew 's next trip will be frontlines of the Syrian war. His first ever trip was organized by Untamed Borders, an adventure travel company with a peculiar specialty high-risk travel. The company specializes in trips to Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, former Soviet Central Asia and the Caucasus.
My building friend Kaustubh Upadhye runs an adventure tour outfit, takes his clients to far flung destinations for dare devil stuff. Recently he was with a group of adventure tourists to Laddakh to spot snow leopards. And of course, the group spotted snow leopards to their delight. The global adventure travel market is growing leaps and bound and now valued at roughly 263 billion dollars. A research on the mindset of these adventure tourists also found that such tourists spends an average of 40 hours researching their trips. A summer sojourn in a war zone would naturally need a bit more time. An increasing number of travelers are becoming more and more intrigued by the prospect of danger/disaster-tourism and adventure trips. But the likes of a safari in IS infested territory is not everyone's cup of tea. For the rest of us, there's rafting in frigid Himalayan waters or swimming with great whites or riding a Bullet from Mumbai to Ladakh or joining an expedition to the South Pole. But the fact remains that the Indian adventure travel market is relatively small, estimated at Rs.500 crore. However, last year, French sports retailer Decathlon, trekkers' and adventure junkies' Mecca, doubled its store count to 24. Thomas Cook's 'What Women Want' adventure travel package for female travelers was introduced a few years ago, but the real pick-up happened in 2015, according to the company.
And there's another aspect of the adventure traveler that makes her or him unique. They are competitive. Their journeys are typically about battling the elements and winning. A new app, Adventure Junky has homed in on this peculiar traveller trait and has taken real-life adventure travel and added an element of competition and reward. Clearly, beating Mother Nature's best champions is not enough.
The Music Lovers as Tourists
There are around 20 exotic locations in India which have become destination for different genre music lovers, this includes Ziro in Arunanchal to Naukuchia Tal in Uttrakhand. As many as 15000 music lovers flock in Shillong Music Fest in Nagaland. There is hardly 200 rooms in all the hotels in Shillong but the die hard music lovers do not mind staying at shared rooms offered by the locals just for the sake of their love to music. Ziro Festival of Music, held at Ziro, Arunachal Pradesh, is of having to leave just as Lee Ranaldo and Steve Shelley from seminal noise rock band Sonic Youth were winding down their performance: "I was walking towards the buses, along dark hilly roads with slabs of guitar noise echoing off the hills."
It may be personal bias talking, but the best tales of the road, are the ones that involve music festivals. Of meeting people you otherwise wouldn't run into or bond with, singing along to The Trooper by Iron Maiden with Spanish Hells Angels, discussing racism with an anti-Nazi skinhead, being questioned about the finer nuances of the Hindu view on intoxicating substances at 5 am in a disused airfield in Leipzig and large parts of a night spent running along a highway dotted by farms in Burgum, the Netherlands, having missed the bus to the tiny town of Leeuwarden, the last outpost of civilization and basecamp for the now sadly defunct Waldrock heavy metal festival.
There have been several attempts to get a local destination music fest scene going, a tough ask in a country where state governments typically take a dim view of most non-religiously motivated gatherings. And where travelling to see a band usually means heading to Bengaluru or Delhi.. Between the bands at Ziro and the cultural program at the Hornbill Festival, a more broad based week long event that takes place in Nagaland, there's a lot to do for an adventurous traveler: bird watching, treks and cycling tours.
.jpg "A Gumnam Actress Strips Nude to Protest Auto/taxi Fare Hike")
