Promoting Tourism to Reunion Island | Outside of France........

Reunion Island is a truely wonderful place to visit. Sure, it has issues to deal with for promoting its tourism to the outside world and handling tourists on the ground but what country doesn't ?

Réunionese culture is unique - a mix of European, Creole, African, Indian and Chinese. The most commonly used language, Réunion Creole, is essentially derives from French.

Reunion Island offers spectacular travel oppurtunities ranging from quiet and relaxing to highly active. If you're the kind of traveller more interested in an adrenaline rush than sunburn, Reunion Island has a plethora of awesome adventure activities available to you.

Options include hiking the towering heights of the islands famous "cirques" or exploring the underground on a canyoning trip, discovering cascading waterfalls, as well as scuba diving or surfing in the clear waters this Indian Ocean island.

On the south coast is the Piton de la Fournaise "Peak of the Furnace", an active volcano, in fact one of the most active in the world. This is a spectacular day trip - one not to be missed.17 miles of beaches stretch across the west coast, and there are lenty of mountains and forests to explore in between.

Tourism to Reunion Island has been focused on attracting main land French for so long that it appears Reunion Island has forgotten about the outside world.

Ground handlers, like Papangue Tours do a fantastic job in handling the new and challenging tasks of an influx of Australian tourists. Hotels are facing up to the fact that a passing knowledge of English is simply not good enough to make the first impression required to inspire tourists to recommend Reunion Island as a holiday destination. Airlines are making changes to their on board service to handle Australians used to having the choice of the worlds best airlines flying out of Australian airports.

Reunion and Beyond have brochured a dedicated stopover and holiday program for Air Austral with 10 pages of Reunion Island content.

Many peolpe ask our opinion on how tourism in Reunion will progress. Now that Air Austral have entered the Australian market, there is competition for the Australian Mauritius market. And by all accounts Air Austral arent going anywhere - reporting a modest profit in the midst of the 2010 GFC.

The task facing Reunion Island is not an insurmountable. Often people point to Mauritius as a shining example of how to implement a holistic tourism aproach with fantastic results. Mauritius is only 45 minutes away - on a clear day you can see one island from the other.
During such a conversation however it is crucial to never compare the two destinations.

Mauritius is an independant country, while Reunion Island is basically a French outpost in the Indian Ocean. With this comes its own problems but also leadership and funding.

The two landscapes are like chalk and cheese and existing tourism infrastructure in Reunion in comparison to Mauritius is non exisitent.Where Mauritius has more 5 star resorts than it knows what to do with - Reunion's 4 & 5 star resorts can be counted on one hand.

We think tourism in Reunion will grow - and that in general the island will experience a tangeable benefit from this through their economy.

Reunion Island is a place to get out and explore, discover and learn where Mauritius is a place to relax in resort oppulence. The two actually compliment each other perfectly as combination of adventure and rest.

Check out the 2009 Saatchi and Saatchi Reunion Island Tourism Promotion Video



View our Travel Agent Educational Trip Review of Reunion Island

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