March 29, 2024

Baguio City received a flood of travel requests from tourists after entry protocols were eased up.
City Tourism Operations Officer Aloysius Mapalo said they received 2,558 requests in their registration portal visita.baguio.gov. ph. on March 2, the day when the city imposed the new travel guidelines that did away with the travel authority and testing requirements.
On March 3, a total of 5,140 registrations were posted with 476 expected tourist arrivals.
As of March 5, the numbers of expected tourist arrivals are 980 on March 4; 1,981 on March 5; 983 on March 6; and 380 on March 7.
“While we are receiving more travel requests through Baguio Visita registrations, the surge is not even half of our previous number in tourist arrivals. It will take time to pick up, and we may see larger numbers towards the Holy Week at the end of the month, if we’ll continue with the entry guidelines we have now,” Mapalo said.
For this weekend, the expected number of tourists is already almost 3,000, covering Friday and Saturday only, the usual peak days of the week.  Prior to the pandemic, we average at 10,000 and may reach up to 20,000 on normal weekends during non-peak seasons. It’s different during peak season weekends such as Holy Week, Christmas, or Panagbenga seasons. We can have up to 100,000 for a two-day weekend alone,” he added.  – Aileen P. Refuerzo