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Bali topples Sri Lanka from top spot as ‘best value’ long-haul travel destination
September 30, 2013 03:18 pm
Ada Derana
The sun-kissed Indonesian island of Bali has toppled Sri Lanka from the top spot as the ‘best value’ long-haul travel option in a new list of popular holiday destinations.
The latest Post Office Travel Money Long Haul Report - which gauges the countries that offer the most in return for tourists’ holiday cash - shows Sri Lanka slipping to fifth place behind South Africa, Vietnam and Thailand.
This decline is put down to a 45 per cent price rise in costs at Sri Lankan resorts.
Resort costs have fallen in half of long haul destinations - in most cases because of the improving performance of the pound.
The Post Office report found that prices in Bali for 2013 fell by one per cent to give the Indonesian island a clear lead over second placed South Africa, while resort prices in Sri Lanka had risen for the second year running.
It calculated the cost of ten tourist staples in the capital Colombo - including itsems such as suncream, insect repellant and a three-course meal for two with wine - to come to a total of £54.45.
Although the average price of a cup of coffee, at 26 pence, was the cheapest across the board, Sri Lanka displayed the biggest cost rise in any of the destinations surveyed, with prices for all ten commodities 24 per cent higher than in Bali (£43.91), the outright winner.
Vietnam and Thailand took third and fourth place.
Vietnam remains competitively-priced (£53.04 for the ten staples) and has proved a success story in 2013 as sales of its currency, the dong, have grown 106 per cent compared to this time last year.
Following a summer when long haul destinations took nine of the top ten Fastest Growing Currencies places (in the Post Office’s survey on which currencies are enjoying a boom in demand with travellers), it seems that getting some winter sun is not too far out of reach for UK travellers.
While sterling remains weak in Europe, it has strengthened against many long-haul currencies.
Theme park favourite Orlando emerged as the best value of five USA destinations.
This made it the only US entry into the Long Haul Report top ten. It proved to be a third cheaper than Miami, which in turn was more expensive than New York, San Francisco and Washington D.C.
Destinations Down Under were again most expensive in the survey.
The ten tourist items cost £121.35 in New Zealand (Auckland) and £124.69 in Australia (Darwin), although the Australian dollar’s fall against sterling means prices are 10 per cent lower than last year.
Andrew Brown of Post Office Travel Money said, “After a summer when sterling bought less holiday cash for trips to Europe, winter sun tourists can look forward to seeing their pounds stretch further in many of the most popular long haul destinations,” Daily Mail reports.
