GARDEN GROVE, Calif. -- Contiki Holidays, a youth tour
specialist, is taking a cue from active tour operators and is
adding hiking, bicycling, kayaking and other sports to some of its
programs.
The international tour operator has released Adventure Plus
itineraries in its 1998 North America brochure. "We believe there
is a market out there that doesn't want to do regular touring,"
said Lorraine Sharp, vice president of sales and marketing. "This
is for people who are very active and don't want to sit for long
periods of time."
The programs also are different from Contiki itineraries in that
they will be limited to 13 passengers and will use minivans rather
than motorcoaches.
Unlike Backroads, the Berkeley, Calif.-based tour operator that
has made such active programs a focus, Contiki's tours will be for
budget-minded travelers and aimed at the 18-to-35 age group that
Contiki will continue to target, Sharp said.
All of these tours will be camping trips. Some examples are a
California Coast Bicycling Tour, an eight-day program cycling from
San Francisco to Los Angeles, or the reverse, starting at $575 per
person. The group will ride about 40 to 50 miles a day; but there
is a van that picks up those who tire of bicycling.
Other programs are a six-day Yosemite National Park Hiking
Adventure, which involves walking and camping in different areas of
the park. It starts at $359 per person.
Expected to be the most popular, Sharp said, is the 10-day
National Parks Canyon Discoveries, which features hiking and
mountain biking in Zion, Bryne, Arches, Canyonlands, Monument
Valley and the Grand Canyon. It starts at $665 per person.
Also new from Contiki are additions to its regular tour
roster.
Contiki is introducing a 14-day European Delight tour that
visits England, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Austria, Italy,
Switzerland and France. Land-only prices start at $975 per person
and air-inclusive prices start at $1,465.
Another new option is a 19-day European Impressions tour that
visits England, France, Spain, Monaco, Italy, Austria, Germany,
Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Belgium. Land-only
prices start at $1,325, and air-inclusive prices start at
$1,690.
Contiki also created a cruise program for 1998 using Royal
Olympic Cruises in Greece.
The sailings can be used as a tour extension or
independently.
Sharp said Contiki, which carried 75,000 passengers from 17
countries this year, has experienced 25% growth in passenger
numbers this year compared with 1996. She attributed the growth to
increased awareness of Contiki's product by travel agents and
strong sales efforts.
She said the 1998 Contiki brochure has several features that
should help agents sell the programs, including a chart showing the
difference between the company's superior and budget programs.
The firm's superior trips use tourist-class hotels with private
baths, starting from $79 per day; the budget tours feature some
Contiki-owned facilties that are "a step up from youth hosteling."
These include rooms shared by several occupants and shared bath
facilities. The price for the budget programs start at $56 a
day.
There is also a chart, comparing the cost of Contiki's Europe
tours with a typical backpacker's Eurail Pass trip of Europe. "We
show that there is a savings of $800 using Contiki over someone
taking their own trip with a Eurail Pass," she said. "This should
help an agent sell our programs, which give a commission, when
backpackers come in just wanting an airline ticket and rail
pass."