WHILE Tunisia is established as a late-booking winter-sun destination for couples, its reputation as a family choice in summer is growing due to its range of resort hotels.
The country now has a good stock of quality, spacious beachfront properties, a growing number of children’s clubs and a solid base of regional charter flights from the UK.
For summer 2000 Airtours is introducing charter flights to Tunisia from Bristol, Glasgow and Stansted. They will complement the operator’s existing flights from Gatwick, Luton, Birmingham, East Midlands and Manchester. Airtours currently carries 70,000 passengers to the country.
Upmarket operator Cadogan Holidays, which mainly uses scheduled services from Gatwick and Heathrow, has set up a sales unit to buy in charter seats for clients who prefer to travel to their destination from the regions.
Operators such as Airtours, Panorama and First Choice have all boosted summer sales to Tunisia with early-booking offers and free child places – Airtours has in addition offered a £100 discount per booking.
TABLE: Port El Kantaoui: the port’s Hotel Soviva is recommended by First Choice for its huge pool and kids’ club
Short breaks for couples
City-break operators Cresta and Travelscene, Tunisia specialist Wigmore Holidays and Airtours-owned Panorama feature the capital Tunis, which has enough to keep clients busy for a long weekend.
All four promote the city as a winter destination, with temperatures usually around 10C warmer than in the UK between November and April.
The city’s old town, or Medina, dates back to 1235 and has been designated a United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation World Heritage Site.
Its covered markets sell leather goods and carpets, while the Bardo Museum has a world-famous collection of Roman mosaics.
About a 1hr drive away are the ruins of ancient Carthage and the beautifully picturesque blue and white painted town of Sidi Bou Said.
Two-night breaks in Tunis with Travelscene start at £307, including flights and hotel accommodation, while Cadogan’s next Tunisia winter brochure features three-night breaks at the deluxe Royal Azur in Hammamet.
This hotel has a thalassotherapy centre around which a number of health and beauty treatments have been designed. Prices are from £318 for three nights’ bed and breakfast in a twin room. This includes scheduled flights from Gatwick.
Family beach holidays
Most packages to Tunisia are offered either on a half-board, full-board or all-inclusive basis.
In line with the general trend, operators report that all-inclusive properties in the resorts of Hammamet, Skanes and Port El Kantaoui are selling well as more Britons warm to the idea of paying for everything upfront.
This particularly suits families as children can get unlimited drinks and snacks all day.
All-inclusives in Tunisia account for 30%-40% of Airtours’ sales and its top-selling property for families is the three-star Sahara Beach hotel in Skanes, near Monastir. It offers a children’s club and all-you-can-eat breakfast, lunch and dinner buffets. The adult price leads in at £519 for seven nights with the first child costing £49 and subsequent children £363.30.
First Choice recommends the three-star Hotel Soviva in Port El Kantaoui for families as it has a huge pool and water slides as well as a children’s club. The adult lead-in price is £249 for seven nights’ half-board this summer. The child lead-in is £129.
Cadogan singles out the four-star Tryp Marco Polo hotel in Hammamet for its children’s club and spacious rooms that can accommodate two adults and two children in comfort. Seven nights cost from £509 half-board for adults, £305 for children.
Cosmos says its most popular family hotel is the Hotel Club Sunrise in Skanes, near Monastir, an all-inclusive with a children’s club and sport activities for adults. One-week prices start at £419 for adults and £179 for children.
Sahara Desert tours and Roman Tunisia
Tunisia attracted a huge amount of press coverage last year in the run-up to the release of Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom Menace, filmed in the Sahara Desert.
Many operators now offer pre-bookable three or four-day desert tours as an add-on. Panorama’s dedicated Tunisia brochure offers a four-day desert safari from April to October from £119 including three-star accommodation and full-board.
Clients travel south from Hammamet or Port El Kantaoui by four-wheel-drive landcruiser. As well as the desert dunes and oases, the tour takes in the Roman Colosseum at El Djem and the cave dwellings of Matmata, where the original Star Wars film was shot.
If clients want to spend more time exploring Roman sites around the country, Wigmore Holidays can tailor-make a flydrive package, from around £600 per person, based on two sharing accommodation for seven nights and car hire.
Agents will find similar add-on tours in Cadogan’s dedicated Tunisia brochure and in the summer-sun brochures of Thomson and Cosmos.
JMC offers a seven-night Tunisian Discovery coach tour that takes in El Djem, Matmata, the holy city of Kairouan, the Roman sites of Dougga and Sbeitla and the town of Tozeur. Prices start at around £509 including flights, three-star accommodation with full-board and entrance fees to sights.