About 5.18 million tourists visited Crimea in January-November 2017, which was 3.7 percent less than a year ago, the Crimean Ministry of Resorts and Tourism said on December 4.
“A total of 5,180,500 tourists visited Crimea in January-November 2017, which was 3.7 percent less than in the same period last year,” the ministry said.
Most tourists rented apartments from the local population, the ministry said.
“Hotels and lodges of Crimea accommodated 1.201 million organized tourists in January-November 2017. Average hotel occupancy over the year stood at 38.5 percent and at 27.3 percent for November,” the ministry said.
As they usually do, most travelers preferred spending their vacation on the southern coast of Crimea (44.5 percent). Some 21.9 percent of tourists chose the west coast, 19.2 percent traveled to the east coast, and 14.4 percent visited other regions (the city of Simferopol and the Simferopol and Bakhchysarai regions).
The republic had 5.6 million tourists in 2016 or 21 percent more than the year before, the ministry said.
The Russian Union of the Travel Industry (RUTI) branch in the Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol said that tourist arrivals in Crimea dipped by at least 20 percent after Turkey’s reopening for Russian travellers, the ruble’s strengthening, the abnormal cold in May and June, and the increase in airfare.
The booking of air tickets to Crimea through the Aviasales search engine decreased by 20 percent in the first ten months of 2017, a representative of the service, Janis Dzenis, said.
