The number of guests staying in Abu Dhabi's hotels and hotel apartments increased by six per cent last month compared with the same month last year, says the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority (ADTA). A total of 122,475 guests stayed in properties in the emirate last month, the ADTA said. "This is a particularly heartening result given that August is traditionally a slow month, being one of the hottest, and which this year also coincided with Ramadan," said Mubarak al Muhairi, the director general of the ADTA.
The number of hotel guests staying in Abu Dhabi in the first eight months of this year rose 15 per cent to 1,196,768 guests compared with the same period last year. "Year-on-year we are two-thirds of the way to achieving our annual target of a 10 per cent increase in hotel guests to 1.65 million and this is without the pull of our headline attraction, Ferrari World Abu Dhabi, which will open in October and ... the Formula One Grand Prix, which takes place in November," said Mr al Muhairi.
Because of an increase in hotels in the emirate, however, occupancy levels fell 21 per cent to 51 per cent last month, while average room rates were down almost a quarter. rbundhun@thenational.ae