December 19, 2024 TnH Global

Taiwan is a year-round, tourist-friendly destination: TTA India Rep. Saxena

Taiwan is a year-round and tourist-friendly destination. It is easily accessible, with seamless intra-destination connectivity. The country boasts state-of-the-art modern tourism infrastructure, including hotels and resorts across every price point and category. The island is teeming with cultural, heritage, and entertainment sites, as well as theme parks, indoor and outdoor activities, and much more. Highlighting these facets at a recent roadshow in Delhi, Taiwan Tourism Administration’s (TTA) India Representative, Noel Saxena, pitched Taiwan to the Indian travel trade for all segments, including leisure, business, family, and MICE markets.

While pitching Taiwan as a year-round destination, Saxena said, “Taiwan boasts of very pleasant year-round weather, with minimum to maximum temperatures hovering from 20-22 Degrees Celsius up to 28 Degrees Celsius. Inter-city travel within Taiwan is very easy, with easy access to any site or attraction, whether located within the city, on its outskirts, or in the countryside. It’s very easy and inexpensive to buy an MRT ticket to travel around.”

Taiwan also boasts of highly developed modes of air, rail, and road transportation. Its high-speed railways make commuting between Taipei, located on the northern fringe of the island, and Kaohsiung, located on the southern fringe, or places like Taichung in the middle of the two, a matter of an hour or two. Besides, as Saxena pointed out, today self-drive options are not only easily and widely available in Taiwan, but they are also being increasingly availed by visitors and tourists, further enhancing tourists’ experience of enjoying the destination at their own pace and time.

Addressing concerns around the language barrier, Saxena pointed out that while there may have been a time when signage, boards, brochures, or information were only available in Mandarin, today all of these, from signposts to train tickets, are also available in English.

Saxena particularly emphasized the ‘shopping’ experience in Taiwan labeling ‘shopping in Taiwan’ as an epic experience that alone can be a reason to visit Taiwan. “Every city in Taiwan boasts of massive shopping infrastructure, from the most modern state-of-the-art malls and shopping complex with all the top-notch international and domestic Taiwanese brands to great value street and flea markets as well as night markets,” he said while also adding, “Not only you get great value for your money, but the quality and durability of the products are also undeniably incredible and unmatched.”

Dwelling on Visa concerns, Saxena informed that both TTA and concerned authorities are highly committed to bringing greater ease in visa facilitation to make travelling to Taiwan a seamless and easy experience for Indian visitors. He also informed that in due course, and hopefully sooner than later, there may be a visa-free travel arrangement for Indian travellers. Saxena, however, also pointed out that it’s very easy for Indians with valid or even expired visas from the UK, US, Schengen, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan, to apply for and get Taiwanese visas.

Saxena informed that apart from the eVisa facility, Taiwan also offers free visa travel to groups of five or more travellers. The initiative is aimed at positioning Taiwan as a seamless, hassle-free, and attractive value destination for small, medium as well as large incentive, MICE, and other business event groups.

Other than cultural and heritage sites, monuments, nightlife, shopping, beach, and island experiences, Saxena also highlighted places such as Taipei Zoo, hot-water springs, resorts or boutique hotel properties with hot-water springs located within their vicinity, mountain-escape, water-based and outdoors mountain adventures as some of its myriad other tourism offerings and activities.