2023-04-29 13:21:00
After a busy Flemish holiday period, gites were expecting a similar trend for the Walloon holidays. “At first, I was happy. I was thinking that we would have twice a fortnight of full reservations, well, unfortunately not“, regrets Joëlle, an owner of a gîte.
“During the Easter holidays with Dutch speakers it was 100% full and now with the spring holidays I have 70% full but only Dutch speakers“, she adds.
In terms of reservations, Émilie is doing a little better than Joëlle, but the observation remains similar on one point: “We thought we had more Walloons in our reservations, but we end up with a majority of Dutch speakers. On the first week, the Netherlands are also on vacation. In the first week of May, we still have customers who speak Dutch, we will see for the second week. But for the Walloons, it is often a last minute vacation.”
With the gloomy weather at the start of the year, many Walloons flew off in search of the sun to more distant destinations. This has an impact on occupancy rates here: 50% for gites, 30% for guest rooms, 60% for large capacity gites.
However, these average results should not be used to draw negative conclusions on the reform of the school rhythm which led to this shift in the holidays with the Flemish part of the country. “It’s too premature“, says Khevyn Torres, the spokesperson for the Federation of Gîtes de Wallonie.
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