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Surfers Paradise is a fantastic beach town as well as an expansive commercial center, situated in the heart of the Gold Coast, on the eastern coast of Queensland, in Australia. Located about 80 kilometers south of Brisbane, Surfers Paradise is more popularly known as Surfers.

The destination provides superb options to cater to all types of visitors touring the place, with its picturesque beach, fabulous shopping as well as dining options, exuberant nightlife, a range of fun attractions, and high rise apartment towers. Hence, it is not a wonder why Surfers Paradise has been acknowledged as ‘the playground of the Golf Coast.’

Surfers Paradise boasts of an excellent beachfront, packed with an array of restaurants, cafes, and upscale accommodations. Stretching along the Gold Coast, Surfers Paradise is well patrolled by the Gold Coast City Council lifeguards, and is one of the safest as well as cleanest beaches in the Gold Coast area.

You can indulge in a spectrum of activities here, from surfing, parasailing and jet skiing to fishing and whale watching cruises. A number of flags of different colors can be found in certain areas of the beach, which in turn allows you for an enjoyable as well as safe swimming and surfing.

For instance, flag with a combination of red and yellow colors indicates the safest swimming area. But, yellow flag cautions dangerous conditions. If you see red flag, don’t ever take an attempt for swimming or fishing in this area. In the case of red and white chequered flag, it denotes that there is shark in this area. In addition, if you see a blue flag, it denotes board riding area perfect for surfers.

Other than water sport activities, there are also superb options available for playing beach volleyball, bungee jumping, and golf, with a variety of professional as well as stylish golf courses. If you do not want to indulge in any of these activities, then just take a stroll along the beach and experience the incredibility of the area.

Likewise, if you are here for a fun-filled vacation, then you can head to any of a variety of theme parks found in and around Surfers Paradise, such as, Warner Bros Movie World, Sea World, Dreamworld, and Wet N Wild Waterpark. When comes to sightseeing, Surfers Paradise features a plethora of attractions in the form of museums, art galleries, and fun and amusement centers.

A trip to Surfers Paradise would not be complete without taking a tour to Cavill Mall. Situated at the heart of the bustling area of Surfers, Cavill Mall is a pedestrained area that runs between the Gold Coast Highway and the Esplanade on the beachfront. This area is packed with a range of outdoor cafes, fast food centers, and restaurants and bars. Additionally, Cavill Mall is much famed for its themed museums, street entertainers, amusement arcades, shopping malls, and surf clothing outlets.

Equally fabulous is dining options available in Surfers Paradise, with a plethora of street side eateries, open air cafes, fast food establishments, and superb restaurants such as the Hard Rock Cafe. From Australian, French, and Italian to Indian, Thai, and Japanese, a sumptuous variety of cuisines can be savored here. Above all, Surfers Paradise is much famed for its exciting nightlife, boasting of a myriad of adult bars, themed venues, and adult bars, of which many of them are concentrated around such hot spots of the city as Cavill Avenue and Orchid Avenue.

With these scores of attractions and superb options to enjoy a plethora of activities, it is not a wonder why a large number of tourists from every nook and corner of the world visit here. Hence, it has a continuum of accommodations options for every type of travelers. One of the most popular choices among tourists is upscale hotels with rooms replete with most sophisticated facilities and amenities such as air conditioning, tea/coffee making facilities, and superb bath areas.

There are also some high end hotels that provide accommodation in the form of apartment style. This choice usually contains one or two bedrooms, apart from fully equipped kitchens, ensuite bathrooms, beautiful dining areas, and balconies offering panoramic views of beach and the Gold Coast. Further, these choices, in most cases, would be complete with facilities such as outdoor heated pools, gymnasium, spa, poolside BBQ, sauna and steam room, and entertainment areas.

We Welcome you to “ORCHID RETREAT”… Home away from Home

Enjoy your stay with an Indian family and have a further insight of our “Incredible India”.

Brief of your Indian family : My name is Kumar and I live with my parents who are of age. My father was in the Indian Foreign Service and his last posting was in Trinidad & Tobago. I had the opportunity of being with my father in Indonesia, Burma and Japan ; after which I pursued my further studies in New Delhi as my father was transferred to Laos as Political Advisor, which was a non family Station. I was associated with Japan Airlines for a span of 23 years and presently am promoting a Destination Management Company.

Orchid Retreat is centrally located in the heart of Delhi and our Bed & Breakfast Establishment has been approved by the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India, New Delhi under the Gold Class category. The rooms are spacious and aesthetically designed and offer you the comforts of a modern world with true Indian hospitality.

Welcome a guest – Make a friend is the essence of the Scheme floated by the Ministry of Tourism and we care as experience has taught us to be sensitive to each individual’s needs.

Surrounded by three great water bodies, namely, Indian Ocean, Arabian sea and Bay of Bengal South India has stunning grandeur and beauty with lush green tropical vegetation in the coastal areas. The tropical climate is less harsh than in the North India. The place is rich in flora and fauna, biodiversity, habitats and ecosystems. South Indian states are Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. These states are very fertile and rich in natural resources. Due to sheer natural beauty of its beaches, hill stations and landscapes South India has become a great destination for tourists. With the hordes of tourists’ inflow, South India Tourism has seen a spectacular growth over last two decades.

Dravidian is the name attributed to a linguistically distinct group of people in South India. Believed to be the first original settlers of ancient India, the group has maintained traditional customs and rites, while with the influence of modernity, some have developed the lifestyles of a modern society.

On South India Tours one can easily detect the uniqueness of culture, language and lifestyles of people. The Dravidian family of languages, namely, Malayalam, Kannada, Tamil and Telugu are distinctly different from the North Indian languages such as Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali and Gujarati. Thanks to their affinity with the old culture, not only South Indians have a distinct language system, their history, literature, architecture, music, spiritual inclination, dress, cuisine and a world view all are way different than those of North Indians.

The history of the South India is believed to have begun with the Sangam age (200 BC-300 AD). The Sangam Age had a number of empires namely Cholas, Pandyas, Pallavas, Cheras, Chalukyans and Vijayanagar. The Cholas who ruled between 300 BC and 1250 AD were the earliest and most famous and perhaps influential among the South Indian dynasties. They were on the eastern Coramandal coast presently in Tamil Nadu. They climaxed between the ninth and thirteenth centuries when they ruled the entire South India, including east and some part of the western coast. They also conquered Ceylon (presently Srilanka), Srivijaya, Malaya and the Maldives islands. With a powerful navy and marine trade and commerce they extended their business to the Far East. Not surprisingly, their art and architecture have left a deep impact in Sumatra and Java islands of Indonesia and in some parts of Malaysia. With any package tour to South India one can visit many Chola style temples scattered throughout the Southern India whose stone inscriptions have helped to reconstruct and decipher the mysteries Indian history.

The Cheras was another ancient powerful dynasty mainly in Tamil Nadu which ruled the South India for most of its early history. They ruled the Malabar coast in Kerala State. The Pandyas were in the south central part. Although these dynasties being obstreperous and hostile to each other remained in a constant conflict with each other, the language, arts and literature prospered in the period. The Vijyanagar Empure (1336-1565 AD) started with resistance to the Muslim invasion of the Hoysala region by Malik Kafur. And only within half a century, the Vijayanagar Kingdom became one of the most powerful empire that ruled for nearly 200 years. Prosperous with strong army and maritime base, they also flourished art and literature. Their Hampi ruins are scattered over an area of 14 square miles regarded as world’s biggest open-air museum. For witnessing the history frozen in stone, do visit Hampi on your South India Tours. They are not only an ancient treasure trove, but also offer much to learn to the scholars of modern art and architecture.

The South India culture had a fascinating aspect in its concept of matriarchal society. One can see even today the celebration of the femininity and motherhood at its best. In literature and philosophy of South India women are considered very powerful. A married woman is considered as well powerful as auspicious. She is regarded as the source of shakti or mother-feminine power which protects and empowers her husband and children.

South India boasts of its own music called Carnatic music. Until 12th century AD, the history of Indian music was the same for entire India. When by influence of Muslims and cultural confluence, the Indian music divided into two systems – the North Indian “Hindustani music” and the South Indian “Carnatic music” Continued to develop without external influences, the Carnatic Music is nearly totally unified with different schools based on the same ragas, same solo instruments, mainly the veena, flute, violin, the mridangam and the ghatam.

The South India has also its own cuisine. The staple food is rice and fish, while coconut forms an important ingredient in virtually all the dishes. The curries tend to be hotter and spicy. Rice is combined in diferent ways and proportions with lentils to make dosas, idlis, vadas and uttapams. Sambhar, rasam, dry and curried vegetable and pachadi are the main preparations. Coffee is popular in Tamil Nadu. The typical traditional meal in is served on a “vazhaillai,” a freshly cut banana leaf. If your are planning a tour to South India, savor the local delicacies which are famous through out the world due to their uniqueness and spices.

Culturally, North India and South India have complimented to each other. While in the South India, the ancient cultural mores are preserved and upheld with utmost endearing care while being at the forefront of knowledge and technology, the North India has contributed immensely by enriching the Indian society by assimilating, accepting and absorbing the outside influences.

It is staggering to think that elephants sought higher ground immediately before the Tsunami hit Asian shores on December 26th 2004, while no advanced technology existed in the form of an early warning detection system that could prevent the loss of human life … or so said a spokesperson for the Ministry of Tourism of Sri Lanka. I can’t say for sure. I wasn’t there. I was safe and dry in Varese, Italy at the time, and a long way from Pound Ridge, New York, from where I hail.

I have been honored to be one of the many panelists at the International Institute for Peace Through Tourism Global Summit in Pattaya, Thailand, an organizational conference dedicated to exploring the ways in which tourism can and does promote peace. I was one of the only westerners there and was surrounded by Ministers, Members of Parliament and others dedicated to the concept of sustainable tourism and peaceful tourism.

While I spoke about the strategies that western tourism enterprise has utilized to confront terrorism and natural disaster in the U.S. and Europe over the past few years, my fellow panelists from Sri Lanka, Uganda, Cambodia and South Africa, to name a few, discussed the ways in which terrorism, internal armed-conflict, war and poverty have affected their lives and those of their families and countrymen. Among a group of co-panelists at breakfast one morning, I was the only person to not have held the status of refugee at some point in my life. To the extent I have changed houses or homeland, it has been entirely through choice and a quest for new experience and I know nothing of fleeing for my life or the lives of my children. My colleagues from across the sea, in contrast, have been counting the years, and in some instances, the months, days, hours and minutes of peace.

It is amazing to me that the more I am exposed to through travel and interaction with peoples of other countries, the more ignorant I feel. Like most people, I know that people living in other parts of the world do not share the same standard of living that I do, but I did not know that the single greatest killer of children world-wide is unclean water. I did not know that my colleagues in Jordan get water once a week, but that my female Jordanian colleagues have virtually no “glass ceiling” that prevents them from advancing professionally. I didn’t know that there are still cold-storage containers on the shores of the Andaman coast in Thailand that contain the bodies of unidentified loved ones after the wave hit and I didn’t know that police boats and huge fishing trawlers still lie kilometers from the sea where they lie against buildings, but otherwise upright, as if they are simply dry-docked in the wrong place at the wrong time.

What is sustainable tourism and how can we in the western world assist our brothers and sisters in less developed areas to face problems that affect fragile economies so dependent upon tourism? And how can we, as tourists, promote peace when we travel? So many of us, as individuals as well as public and private enterprise, donate money. Is that the way to assure that families and businesses post traumatic natural or terrorism-related episode continue to survive? It appears, based on what I have seen and heard here, that despite our display of compassion, exemplified by our overwhelming generosity, that this may not be the answer. Houses built with Tsunami donations, for example, but which failed to consult the cultural, physical and spiritual needs of the people, lay vacant. Boats built with Tsunami donations lay idle on the shores awaiting beurocratic clearance before they can be used by Thai fisherman. Tsunami money to Sri Lanka remains unutilized because the Sri Lankan administrative offices charged with administering the money, are located in an area of the country which is governed by a para-military entity not recognized by the U.S. or the United Kingdom.

The best answer seems to be exemplified in the request I heard time and again from His Excellency Akel Biltaji, Special Advisor to His Majesty King Abdullah II of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordon, His Excellency. Eng. Ziad Al-Bandak, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, Palestine National Authority, Ibrahim Yusuf, Ambassador of the Republic of Indonesia, and James Lu, President of the International Hotel and Restaurant Association, to name a few. The way to be a part of sustainable tourism in each of these countries, is for the average tourist to “come back.” This means — to go back to Bali and to Jordan as soon as possible after the recent bombings, to frequent the hotels that were rebuilt after the Tsunami, but that are not yet at full occupancy, to eat the fish caught by local fisherman served in local restaurants and to buy the handicrafts of the indigenous peoples. The way to be part of the movement of “peace through tourism” is to be an ambassador of acceptance, traveling with an open heart and open mind, and demonstrating respect in our words, behavior, and interaction with peoples of all cultures. “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness,” said Mark Twain. In this era of terrorism, a reality that Mr. Twain probably never contemplated, truer words were never spoken. As a general rule, we do not hate people we understand, and we have no reason to destroy what we do not hate.

As I walked around Khao Lak in Thailand, an area that was almost completely washed off the map by a wall of water, I was also reminded of the words of Francis Ford Coppola, “Time is the lens through which dreams are captured.” As my lens captured the images of hotels, local businesses and homes in ruins, I feel that it was simultaneously capturing the ghosts of the people who walked in and out of these thresholds. But, it also captured the dreams of the Thai people to rebuild their land. It captured the dreams of lasting peace of the Sri Lankan people whose internal armed-conflict screamed to a halt because they lost almost all their weapons and ammunition in the wave. And it captured my dream for all of us in the Western world to revisit this world of smiles, elephants, pristine shores, Buddhist temples, limestone caves, blue skies and peaceful waters.

Bharatbook.com is glad to announce a new report titled “Opportunities in Malaysian Tourism Industry (2007-2009)”.

The Malaysian tourism industry continues to grow rapidly, thanks to increasing promotional activities, growing MICE industry and rising level of personal disposable income that are fuelling growth into the country’s tourism industry. Also, being a preferred medical tourism destination and politically stable, the country has become a more profitable tourism industry.

The report provides an in-depth analysis of the present and future prospects of the Malaysian tourism industry. It focuses on different tourism parameters, like inbound & outbound tourism, expenditure by inbound & outbound tourists, accommodation & transportation facilities and medical tourism. The report will help clients to evaluate the opportunities and factors critical to the success of tourism industry in Malaysia.

Key Findings

Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia are important sources of visitors for Malaysia. Beyond ASEAN, tourist arrivals from China and India will remain an important influence throughout the forecast period (2008-2012) as the majority of Chinese tend to weigh their spending towards consumer purchases as opposed to luxury hotel accommodation.

The promotion of Education Tourism will continue to be expanded to expedite the development of Malaysia as a preferred destination for international students. The projected foreign exchange earnings from this potential source of growth are estimated at RM 900 Million by 2010.

It is expected that expenditure by international tourists in Malaysia will increase at a CAGR of 6.63% during the forecasted period.

Increasing disposable income in Malaysia will open the opportunities for both outbound and domestic tourism. It is expected that per head disposable income in the country will increase at a CAGR of 5.06% during 2008-2012.

It is expected that MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions & Exhibitions) industry will be one of the major contributors to the Malaysian tourism industry.

For further information kindly visit: http://www.bharatbook.com/detail.asp?id=50021

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