Visakhapatnam: The chill of the winter is yet to is yet to set but it’s already houseful in Araku, Ananthagiri and few others places, the region’s top winter tourist spots. Lammasingi in Vizag Agency has been attracting scores of tourists during the weekends. Most private hotels and resorts including AP Tourism’s accommodation facilities in Araku region have recorded 100 per cent bookings. Though the APTDC has planned to introduce facilities like resorts and coffee shops at Lammasingi and Dallapalle in Vizag Agency, nothing has done so far and the visitors are struggling to stay in those places.
AP Tourism Development Corporation (APTDC) executive officer R.S. Naidu said that the number of foreign tourists till November in this year, 87,661, was 2,054 more than last year. Besides, the region as seen 1,55,25,214 domestic tourists arriving so far this year. In all of last year, 1,77,14,770 domestic and 85,607 foreign tourists visited in Vizag region in 2016. The partial cancellation of Araku bound Vistadome coach on the Vizag-Kirandul train has hit the gate collection at Borra Caves in October 2017.
In November the gate collection at Borra Caves from November 1 to November 26 stood at Rs 54 lakh, an increase of Rs 24 lakh when compared to November last year. About 75,000 tourists have visited Borra Caves so far this year. Most of the tourists were from West Bengal, Odisha and parts of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana state, said Borra Caves manager M. Badrinath.
Lammasingi under Chintapalle mandal and Dallapalle under Paderu mandal in Vizag Agency owe their popularity to low temperatures and thick fog on a few days during winter.“We visited Lammasingi and Dallapalle recently but we didn’t fell the bone-biting cold and fog as the peak winter is yet to set in in,” said Mr D. Viswanath, a tourist who recently visited the place.
He complained that tourism officials had claimed that resorts and coffee shops in Lammasingi would be ready to offer services to tourists this year but nothing has been done so far. There were no facilities at the tourist spots, he said. A senior officer with the APTDC said that the tourism department would set up resorts at Lammasingh by 2018 but there was resistance from the locals in Dallapalle against the tourist projects as some tourists are indulging in anti-social activities, he added.
