The airline’s executive vice president-commerical Wiwat Piyawiroj, Commercial, said the increase was being introduced to cope with demand by both Japanese and Thai passengers.

THAI’s promotional fare roundtrip on flight TG686 with return on TG687 or TG649 will go fro Bt14,420 per person. For those traveling in a group of four people or more, the price is Bt13,670 per person (taxes and surcharge fees are included).

THAI operates flights to Fukuoka with Airbus A330-300 aircraft, equipped with 36 seats in Royal Silk Class and 263 seats in Economy Class. The flight departs from Bangkok at 00.50am and from Fukuoka at 11.35am for daily flights and departing Bangkok at 9.50am and from Fukuoka at 6.20pm for the additional Monday, Thursday and Saturday flights.

STREETCARS DESIGNED to look like characters from the British animated series “Chuggington,” which depicts the doings of anthropomorphic trains, are roaming the streets of Okayama.

Two cars that look like the Wilson and Brewster characters in the popular series have been used in the Okaden Chuggington attraction since it began service in March.

The streetcars bring cheer to the city’s residents, travelling the same roads as regular automobiles every day except Tuesdays.

“We wanted to turn the entire town into an amusement park,” says a representative of Okayama Electric Tramway Co., the Naka Ward-based company that has operated streetcars in the city since 1912.

The interiors of the special streetcars were designed with the help of Eiji Mitooka.

The company obtained permission from the British company that owns the rights to the series and spent about 500 million yen (about Bt145 million) creating the two cars.

“The streetcars are meant to be ridden, not just used to get around,” the Okayama Electric Tramway representative adds. “We want to bring joy to the city and inspire the dreams of children.”

Eiji Mitooka, designer of many train cars including the Seven Stars in Kyushu, is an

Okayama native who was involved in creating the interiors of the cars.

Shoes are not allowed on board so children can play on the floors. The streetcars can carry 17 adults and 17 children.

The two cars are joined together to travel a 7.35-kilometre route that takes about one hour to complete. During the ride, “navigators” are on board to serve as guides and there are games to play.

There are four rides per day on weekdays and five per day on weekends and holidays, though the schedule is set to change in July.

Tickets – which include entry to the Okaden Museum, a memento and other items – cost 3,400 yen apiece for adults and 1,900 yen for children on weekdays. Prices are 100 yen higher on weekends and holidays. The museum includes Mitooka’s works and Plarail model Chuggington trains among its exhibits.

Registration with the Okaden Chuggington fan club on the Okayama Electric Tramway website is required to make reservations.

In mid-May, Mai Iida, a 29-year-old from Fukuyama, Hiroshima Prefecture, rode the streetcar in a party of four with her two-year-old son.

“We’ve been waiting for this day ever since we made the reservation a month ago,” she says. “It was a really fun experience. The quiz they did on board was also great.”

LOOK OUT Grand Canyon visitors – watch your step before attempting a selfie from the edge of the vertiginously deep and perilously steep US landmark.

The national park surrounding the enormous canyon – the second-most visited US national park, after the Great Smoky Mountains in the country’s southeast – has experienced a distressing surge in fatal accidents, with at least four visitors dying in as many weeks in March and April.

The Grand Canyon experienced an unusual number of accidental deaths this spring. Despite calls for caution, the risky behaviour persists./AFP

The views that draw millions to the park in the high Arizona desert are stunning, both in their rich earth hues and in the sheer immensity of the gap cleaved over aeons by the unceasing Colorado River as it winds sinuously through the canyon bottom.

But the views can also distract or disorient visitors – some of whom take risks despite park rangers’ constant warnings – and the result can be fatal.

The body of a Japanese tourist was the first one found this spring, located in a wooded area some distance from the rocky cliffs.

Then came three fatal falls, including that of a fifty-something tourist from Hong Kong who toppled over the edge while snapping photos.

The park has placed protective barriers at some popular vista points, but “we don’t want to put barriers everywhere,” park spokeswoman Kris Fister says. “The specialness about parks is not being enclosed.

“You don’t have a barrier between you and this amazing place,” she adds, “but you have to pay attention.”

“We tell people to stay on the designated trails and walkways and to keep a safe distance from the rim” – and of course, to pay attention when taking pictures, says Fister, who is dressed in the grey military-style shirt and khaki pants of a park ranger.

“That’s pretty common sense.”

But at the park’s Mather Point, which offers especially scenic views not far from the visitor centre on the canyon’s South Rim, the message does not always get through.

This natural vista point, the most heavily visited in the park, may be the spot in the US most often captured in visitors’ selfies.

From here to the canyon’s North Rim is a distance of 16 kilometres.

There are protective barriers. But not far away, a young woman ventures to the very edge of the cliff.

The Grand Canyon experienced an unusual number of accidental deaths this spring. Despite calls for caution, the risky behaviour persists./AFP

“We can see well enough from here,” British tourist Kathryn Kelly sniffs dismissively, looking at the risk-taking woman. “I don’t see the point stepping closer to the edge.”

“I heard of a man who died trying to take a selfie, and I’m struggling to feel sorry for him,” Kelly says. “It’s a kind of natural selection.”

Of the dozen people who, on average, die each year in the canyon, relatively few fall to their deaths, according to park service statistics.

Most deaths are linked to the dramatic change in altitude and to dehydration in the crushing summer heat faced by hikers – despite the frequent warning signs that say things like “Don’t become a statistic” and “Down is optional, up is mandatory.”

But for those who make it to the bottom of the canyon, near the turbulent, muddy waters of the Colorado, Phantom Ranch offers a welcome oasis, a place to rest and spend the night after long, draining hours of hiking.

Among the books on a shelf in the ranch’s dining room is one that lists every death registered in the park: “Over the Edge: Death in Grand Canyon.”

Falls, flash flooding, drowning, storms, snakes, suicides, even murders … there are as many ways to die in the Grand Canyon as there are ways to photograph (and of course Instagram) it.

Jim Stanley, a 71-year-old from Michigan, read the book before taking on this dangerous wonder of nature, where nearly seven million visitors are expected this year for the 100th anniversary of Grand Canyon’s classification as a national park.

“I haven’t been discouraged; I’m now aware of the risks,” he says, his hiking pants proudly held up by a pair of suspenders in the red, white and blue of the American flag.

“Too many people take the Grand Canyon for granted,” he adds. “But it’s not Disneyland.”

There has always been an element of mystery, or mysticism, surrounding the park and its awe-inspiring landscape. The numerous accidental deaths in its vast territory through the years have even given rise to a sort of earthbound Bermuda Triangle vibe.

Two aeroplanes once collided above the canyon, claiming 128 lives in what, at the time, was the worst commercial aviation accident in US history.

That was in 1956, long before the advent of the selfie.

IN RECENT times the imperial city of Fez has been overlooked by tourists in favour of Marrakesh, but now Morocco’s “spiritual” capital is bustling with visitors due to major renovations and low-cost flights.

“It is an open air museum, with the largest pedestrian zone in the world and its 10,000 alleyways,” says Yassir Jawra, vice president of the Fez tourism commission.

Fez “is the spiritual capital of Morocco, famed for its culture and its (age-old) handicraft work,” he adds.

Since 2013, more than one billion dirhams (Bt3.23 billion) of investment have been poured into Fez to restore the ninth-century walled medina and develop tourism.

A Moroccan man walks in the tannery in the medina.

The medina, home to the world’s oldest working library, was listed as a Unesco World Heritage Site in 1981 for its “outstanding universal value”.

Guardian of priceless treatises in Islamic studies, astronomy and medicine, the library is nestled in the maze of narrow and dark alleyways which tourists and donkey-drawn carts can struggle to navigate.

Like many monuments, it has been renovated after the authorities in the late 1980s sounded the alarm in a report saying that more than half of the buildings in the medina were crumbling and 10 per cent were threatened with ruin following years of neglect and a lack of public funds.

Behind the high crenellated walls that surround the medina lie 9,000 historical houses, 11 madrassas, 83 mausoleums, 176 mosques and 1,200 handicraft workshops.

Patrician palaces with their secret gardens and terraces, elegant fountains and ancient caravansary, or inns, are among the jewels lying there to be discovered.

According to Fouad Serrhini, head of the Agency of Development and Restoration tasked with rehabilitating the medina, “thousands” of buildings and monuments have been saved from ruin since 2013.

“They were chosen according to their state of degradation and how urgently the work was needed,” he explains.

In all, 4,000 buildings were saved between 2013 and 2018, while 27 monuments were restored.

In mid-April, King Mohammed VI visited Fez to inaugurate some buildings that had been renovated and launch the second phase of the rehabilitation programme.

Men gather at the Moulay Idriss II mausoleum.

Following his visit, authorities issued a report insisting that the rehabilitation work respect the medina’s “authenticity” and “original architecture”.

“The ancient medina is a live treasure, hidden and secret, which cannot be taken lightly,” says Salim Belghazi, a 33-year-old who has transformed his 14th-century riad, or traditional family home, into a private museum.

Belghazi, who hails from a wealthy background, says he hopes that despite the transformation, Fez will maintain its soul.

Meanwhile, tourists are flocking to Fez, where the regional Fes-Saiss airport has undergone an expansion to accommodate the growing number of visitors and low-cost flights mainly from across Europe.

The number of passengers has jumped from 108,000 in 2004 to more than a million in 2018, according to official figures.

But Marrakesh remains the country’s top tourist destination, with more than two million arrivals in 2017.

Tourism is a major source of revenue for Morocco, which received more than 12 million visitors in 2018, according to official figures, Abderahim Belkhayat, head of a regional body of artisans, says the influx of visitors to Fez “benefits” craftsmen, noting that three quarters of the medina’s residents earn a living directly or indirectly from the sector.

Local authorities have mapped out a “vision” to revamp the sector by giving it a “new look” in order to produce “high quality” crafts, he adds.

A view of the tannery in the ninthcentury walled medina in the ancient Moroccan city of Fez.

A 2005 official report indicated that in the long term, authorities hope to transform the medina into a “showcase” of handicrafts while the workshops themselves would be relocated outside the walls.

So far, 6,000 potters and brass and copper workers have been moved into zones with modern infrastructure and tanners are expected to follow suit in a separate location.

The idea is to rid the medina of the cacophony of noise emanating from brassware and potter workshops as well as the pungent odours that rise from the ancient tanneries – the latter a “must” stop on the tourist circuit.

Tourists, their noses covered with mint leaves to ward off the stench, congregate on terraces overlooking the tanneries to snap pictures of the men working below, using the same methods as their ancestors did.

The tanners stand almost knee-deep in large vats containing quicklime, cow urine, salt and water to clean the hides, which they will later soak in pigeon poop and water before the dying process can begin.

The smell is always nauseating.

But the sight seems to delight the visitors and the end result, such as leather belts and bags sold in the boutiques, proves popular with buyers.

Booking.com keeps updated with the trends by offering a selection of six dazzling destinations full of mystery and enchantment fit for a sultan

Agra, India

Agra, which makes up one corner of the Golden Triangle circuited by travellers alongside Delhi and Jaipur, is home to both the Taj Mahal and Agra Fort and is the perfect destination to feel like royalty. Translating as “Crown of the Palaces”, the Taj Mahal and perched on the bank of the Yamuna River, this ivory marble mausoleum was built for the Mughal ruler Shah Jahan’s wife, Mumtaz Mahal. Its intricate architecture and reflecting pool have become an iconic image, making it a top destination for a sultan selfie. The nearby Agra Fort was the main residence of the emperors of the Mughal Dynasty until 1638. Visitors can lose themselves in these regal surroundings to truly picture what the life of a sultan would look like.

Where to stay: The Oberoi Amarvilas Agra is a short walk from the Taj Mahal and boasts sumptuous 5-star accommodation. This lavish hotel combines modern interiors with large windows that capitalise on the beauty that surrounds the building. Visitors can feast at four dining options offering a range of international and local specialties. To indulge in royal treatments, guests can visit the Oberoi Spa for a body massage or treat themselves to a swim or exercise session at the gym.

Muscat, Oman

Oman’s capital Muscat is home to a reallife sultan, Sultan Qaboos bin Said Al Said, who is the longest serving Arab leader, having held the office since 1970. As part of a visit to Muscat, you can bask in the opulent beauty of a landmark that also shares his name, the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque. An active place of worship, the mosque is the fifth largest mosque in the world and was designed as part of a competition that Sultan Qaboos hosted. The impressive boasts a 50-metre-high gold dome and white marble flooring. The men’s prayer hall, which can actually be visited by both genders, is especially captivating, with huge Persian carpets and chandeliers dominating the space.

Where to stay: Surrounded by the glimmering waters of the Gulf of Oman in the Bay of Barr Al Jissah, ShangriLa Al Husn Resort & Spa is the perfect destination. A short drive from Muscat’s city centre and the Sultan Qaboos’ Grand Mosque, the hotel’s decor is inspired by Arabian palaces and accented by authentic Omani artworks. Sun-worshipers can take advantage of the hotel’s private beach, which is set against a dramatic mountainous backdrop.

Jaipur, India

The capital of India’s Rajasthan state is founded by and named after Jai Singh II, the ruler of Amer in 1727. Today, this bustling city is popular with tourists for its pink-hued buildings that have secured it the nickname “the pink city”. One of these beautiful buildings is the Hawa Mahal, a palace of red and pink sandstone, also known as the Palace of Wind. This regal residence is best experienced after sunset as the lights illuminate and the building appears to glow. If pink isn’t your colour, Jaipur is also home to the hillside attraction Amber Palace at Amer Fort.

Where to stay: Relax after a busy day of sightseeing just two miles away from the centre at the palatial Taj Rambagh Palace, known as the “Jewel of Jaipur”. Boasting immaculately manicured gardens and beautiful Indian architecture, this hotel is almost as photogenic as Jaipur’s own palaces. Guests will be treated like royalty with palace butlers who can help guests arrange vintage horsedrawn carriage rides every evening and experienced gurus who host yoga sessions to help guests unwind after a long day of exploration.

Marrakech, Morocco

A former imperial city, Marrakech is home to a large variety of breathtaking mosques, palaces and gardens. As part of your travels, consider taking a walkthrough Bahia Palace, which means “the Palace of the beautiful, the brilliant”. This nineteenth-century palace was built for Si Moussa, chamberlain of Sultan Hassan I and is a cultural hotspot for tourism in Marrakech. The beautiful structure covers almost eight hectares and features the first stained glass windows of the Maghreb, captivating visitors as soon as they set their eyes upon it.

Where to stay: Feel like royalty by booking at stay at the Riad le Clos des Arts surrounded by astonishing interior designs, with every room decorated with a typical Moroccan tile art form. Guests can embrace the peaceful surroundings in the inner courtyard and relax on the roof terrace, featuring a small plunge pool. Centred in the heart of Marrakech, Riad le Clos des Arts is also just a short walk from the Bahia Palace.

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Dubai is known as an opulent destination thanks to its luxury shopping opportunities and outstanding architecture. Visitors to Dubai can further indulge in relaxing treatments by embracing the traditional Arabian Hammam treatment, also known as a Turkish bath. The treatments consist of being soaked with water before applying black soap to the skin and exfoliating it with a kessa glove.

Where to stay: For a truly Arabian experience, opt for Palace Downtown. Located in the heart of a traditional Arabian Village, this luxurious hotel has everything you need on its doorstep, including Hammam monsoon showers, a hot tub and steam rooms.

Istanbul, Turkey

Istanbul was once a city full of royalty in the Sultanahmet district, where chariot races used to take place and, to this day, Egyptian obelisks remain. Istanbul is also home to the historical and architecturally beautiful Blue Mosque, built by Sultan Ahmet I. The Mosque has a large prayer hall under a main dome and boasts six minarets and eight more domes. The mosque also features more than 20,000 exquisite handmade Iznik ceramic style tiles in a variety of tulip designs.

Where to stay: Soho House Istanbul is the place to stay for the modern traveller looking for new horizons to pursue. Featuring three unique buildings including the Chancery and the Annex, a brandnew glass building and a luxurious members club, the Soho House Istanbul has a lot to offer.

Just 200 VIP visitors will get to watch the breathtaking views of the Macy’s Fireworks Spectacular show and enjoy a premium open bar on the 86th Floor Observatory.

From 7pm to 10pm, the Observatory will close to the general public, allowing the special guests private access to the open-air observation deck and the opportunity to view the fireworks from the best vantage point in New York City.

Speakers will play the Fourth of July Fireworks soundtrack while guests enjoy food and drinks, provided by State Grill and Bar. During the celebration, the ESB will shine its world-famous tower lights in dynamic red, white and blue flourishes.

Tickets are $500 each and are available on a first-come, first-served basis.

Tomorrow, celebrants can join the contest on ESB’s Instagram account to win two pairs of tickets to this exclusive event.

Online booking can be made at http://www.EmpireStateBuilding.com/july4.

Over half of Thai travellers (59 per cent) admit they have chosen not to book accommodation because of negative reviews about the host, despite the price, location and quality of the accommodation being exactly what they were looking for.

Insights obtained from 21,500 travellers across 29 markets also revealed that 84 per cent rate reviews as important, to help identify friendly and welcoming hosts. Booking.com also delved into its own user-generated data revealing that on average, the travellers rate the staff higher than any of the other categories that users can rate a property on, such as: services, cleanliness, comfort, value and location.

Nationalities were ranked by difference between the staff score and overall review scores, based on the reviews left by global travellers between January 2017 and January 2019. Only nationalities who left 100,000 or more reviews were included in this analysis.

THE CITY of Paris has chosen an American landscape architect to re-design a huge area surrounding the Eiffel Tower, a project that will banish almost all vehicle traffic near the immensely popular monument.

“We can create the biggest garden in Paris… with much more biodiversity, much more ecology,” Kathryn Gustafson said after Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo presented the plan late Tuesday.

A huge area surrounding the Eiffel Tower will give space to an expansive garden.

Gustafson has studied in France, where she has designed several parks and squares, but is best well known internationally for her memorial fountain for Britain’s Princess Diana in Hyde Park, London.

A total of 54 hectares, currently crisscrossed by several roads including two major thoroughfares on each side of the Seine river, will be largely turned over to pedestrians and “low-impact transportation” such as bus and bike lanes.

In particular, the heavily used car lanes on the Iena bridge which spans the Right and Left Banks underneath the Eiffel Tower will also be given over to lawns and rows of trees, according to a video rendering of the project.

“We’re going to have an extraordinary garden where we’ll hear birds singing once again,” Hidalgo said.

That will be music to the ears of the estimated 150,000 people who visit the site every day during the summer high season, including the 20,000 to 30,000 who climb the tower itself.

Overall, seven million people visit the tower each year.

The expansive garden will stretch from the Ecole Militaire, a military academy dating from the 18th century, to the modernist Trocadero esplanade and its Chaillot Palace, built for the 1937 International Expo.

The project also calls for an overhaul of the vast lawns on the Champ de Mars, the site of dozens of major public events each year, such as concerts or mass viewings of sporting events like the World Cup.

The bulk of the work, expected to cost 72 million euros (Bt2.55 billion), is scheduled to be finished before the start of the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris.

“The Tower will find itself at the centre of a vast park that will make Parisians want to come and visit,” said Jean-Louis Missika, the city’s deputy mayor in charge of urbanism.

Currently there are “too many cars, too much mass tourism, too many coaches,” he said.

THEY ARE YOUNG, Western, and full of praise for Pakistan: Travel influencers have moved in on the “land of the pure”, but critics warn their rose-tinted filters are irresponsible and sell an inaccurate picture of the conservative, militancy-scarred country.

As security improves, cricketer-turned-prime-minister Imran Khan is keen to promote the nation’s tourism potential, with the government claiming it has eased visa restrictions for many foreign visitors.

Pakistanis gather around vegetable stalls in Karachi. /AFP

The push has resulted in an influx of foreign travel bloggers extolling the virtues of its mountains and beaches, as well as its rich heritage and history, from ancient Indus civilisations to Buddhist shrines and Islamic monuments.

“Pakistan, it was the trip of a lifetime,” food and travel YouTuber Mark Wiens told his four million subscribers.

Polish blogger Eva zu Beck informed her followers it could “become the number one tourist destination in the world”, while Canadian social media influencer Rosie Gabrielle said she wanted her stories to “tell the truth” about the country.

But there are concerns influencer content does not reflect the major challenges, from infrastructure to extremism, that Pakistan is facing as it embraces modern tourism.

Zu Beck, whose clip was even shared by officials, cites government commerce initiative Emerging Pakistan, as well as Pakistan International Airlines as partners she’s worked with, while Wiens credits tourism expo Pakistan Travel Mart for “making the amazing trip happen”.

Pakistani Muslims offer Friday prayers at the Wazir Khan Mosque in Lahore on the holy month of Ramadan. /AFP

Gabrielle says her 3,500 kilometre motorcycle trip across the nation was facilitated by a Pakistani association in Oman.

Once seen as an essential stop on the hippie trail, visitor numbers have slumped since the 1970s when the country first underwent sweeping Islamisation then descended into a bloody battle with militancy.

Deadly attacks still occur but security concerns are easing, so authorities and businesses are keen to shake the perception it is a hostile and dangerous place.

They are enthusiastic that so-called social media “influencer” advertising, which generally provides glossy snapshots rather than in-depth investigation, can present an alternative vision of Pakistan to a new generation of young and adventurous travellers.

“People believe them,” says Pakistan Travel Mart chief executive Ali Hamdani, who helped set up Wiens trip, adding that bloggers’ impressions are regarded as “authentic”.

Yet Pakistanis and seasoned foreign travellers warn such posts on social media do not paint a full and honest picture of Pakistan.

Tourism infrastructure is severely underdeveloped, there are opaque government restrictions on places foreigners can visit, and travellers are often harassed – whether by men bothering women in a patriarchal society; or suspicious intelligence officials detaining curious sight-seers or insisting on security escorts.

A man prepares traditional food during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan./EPAEFE

“All this ‘Everything is wonderful in Pakistan’ is just irresponsible,” reveals June, an indignant 51-year-old Briton who declined to give her last name, she had been harassed by a police officer during a visit to the northwestern Swat valley.

Influencers are shielded from many issues that ordinary visitors face, adds Zara Zaman, an attendee at a recent tourism summit in Islamabad.

“All of these travellers are also travelling with crews and are protected by more powerful people,” she argues.

Hamdani, for example, acted as a driver for both Wiens and another influencer, Trevor James, during their visits, smoothing out any issues.

Zu Beck and Gabrielle, were able to visit the southwestern province of Balochistan – famed for its spectacular scenery, but also for violent insurgencies, which means few foreigners are able to visit without the blessing of intelligence agencies.

What influencers publish “doesn’t represent the real experience,” warns Alexandra Reynolds, an American blogger on her fifth trip to Pakistan, adding that there is a risk that less experienced travellers will be misled by such content and potentially end up in trouble.

“In a time when Pakistan’s international reputation is so fragile, it is not something that should be risked,” the 27-year-old explains, revealing that she too experienced harassment from security forces during a previous trip.

Another tourist Sebastiaan, 30, says he was detained for 14 hours and questioned by suspicious government agents in the southern city of Mithi last September.

There is also frustration from Pakistanis that Western bloggers have been feted by authorities, while locals with better cultural understanding – especially of senstive issues such as gender or blasphemy – are sidelined.

“It kinds of makes me angry to have white people represent us. We are not completely done with our post-colonial hangover,” says Zaman.

At the tourism summit a group of the Western bloggers were widely photographed meeting Imran Khan, with no local travel influencers in sight, prompting a backlash on social media. Despite concerns, the bloggers remain enthusiastic.

Zu Beck, 27, has gained a huge following in Pakistan, where a local phone company has sponsored some of her videos.

She insists: “My job is not to love Pakistan. My job is to make content. But I love Pakistan.”