25 June 2016
Muscat - A first-of-its-kind initiative aimed at easing the accommodation shortage in Salalah, especially during the Khareef season, is gaining much popularity since its inception last month.

Named 'Oman Motor Homes', these moving houses have all the amenities and facilities, if not more, that a permanent residential apartment would offer. The spacious kitchen lets the tourists cook their food while other family members can relax inside the home on luxurious sofas. These houses can accommodate not less than 15 people and there are cozy beds, dining area, three water tanks and a toilet, TV, rear camera and GPS facility.

"These houses can reduce the dependency on flats and apartments by a great percentage, and we have three such huge caravans currently in Salalah," Belal Naser, Sales and Marketing Adviser at Motor Home Company told the Observer.

"Oman Motor Home Company aims to support tourism in Oman, because the foreign tourists prefer to travel by a moving home rather than booking a hotel room. Also, as many tourist sites have little or no facilities like a hotel, general toilets and restaurants," Belal Naser said.

He further stated that a large number of foreigners and citizens wanted to invest in motor homes and the company would start leasing services after two months.

According to statistics from the Ministry of Tourism, the number of visitors to Dhofar Governorate last year was about 514,777, and they spent around RO 50 million, of which RO 34 million was spent by Omanis, and 16 million by visitors from other countries.

Dhofar Municipality is expecting this number to go up and the expected number of tourists this year is around one million.

The number of hotel apartments in Dhofar has increased substantially, last year the total number of hotel apartments touched 2,709.

© Oman Daily Observer 2016