THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:
The most discerning of travelers have once again voted Kerala as the Indian destination that best caters to and offers the most rewarding experience for families.
‘God’s Own Country’ further entrenched itself as the best family destination in India at the prestigious Lonely Planet Magazine India (LPMI) Travel Awards 2016. The state has regularly won the distinction at the awards – considered the definitive metric in gauging the Indian traveller’s satisfaction. Kerala Tourism Director U V Jose received the award at a glittering awards show in Mumbai.
The annual awards, which feature a who’s-who of the Indian travel facilitation industry, showcase the best travel experiences available to Indians and anoint the best service providers, the preferred places to stay and the destinations Indians most love to visit.
Kerala, described as a “tropical symphony” where “travelling is as easy and rewarding as a glide through its backwaters”, was judged by the magazine’s readers as the “destination that makes it as easy and convenient as possible for you to travel with your family, offering lots of attractions, activities and sensibly-priced accommodation and dining options, as well as having a local culture that’s friendly and caring towards children and senior citizens”.
Nominations for the awards are shortlisted by a panel of travel experts and professionals, following which readers vote both online and in the magazine. Besides being judged the best place to take the family along for a holiday, Kerala was also nominated in the best destination for culture and to relax categories. There were 20 categories in all.
Ranked alongside the United Kingdom, which won the corresponding award for best international family destination for Indian travelers and is considered the state’s most important tourist market, the Lonely Planet describes Kerala as “a world away from the frenzy of elsewhere, as if India had passed through the Looking Glass and become an altogether more laid-back place”.
The world-renowned travel magazine noted that it was hard to begrudge Kerala its now-synonymous moniker as ‘God’s Own Country’. The felicitation from Lonely Planet is the latest accolade for Kerala Tourism, with its recent multimedia campaign for responsible tourism ‘New Worlds’ bagging the prestigious Golden City Gate Award — dubbed the Oscar of Tourism communication – in March at the world’s leading travel trade show, the Internationale Tourismus-Börse Berlin (ITB-Berlin) 2016.
Kerala Tourism had earlier won the Ulysses Prize of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation for its contribution as a global leader to sustainable tourism.
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