Sergio Gonzalo Rodrigo
Events and seasons: travel is becoming increasingly seasonal
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Another article by the author: Author-led travel: Added value or overused term?; Airlines connecting continents
Sergio Gonzalo Rodrigo
Events and seasons: travel is becoming increasingly seasonal
There can be no doubt that, for one reason or another, we have always travelled with the calendar in hand. Since the dawn of tourism, people have sought to travel on specific dates—whatever they may be—either because a certain time of year offered better climatic conditions for a particular type of trip or tourism (sun and warmth were, and still are, essential for beach tourism just as snow is for skiing, to give only two examples), or because during certain periods of the year it was generally easier to obtain vacation days (due to non-teaching periods or a slowdown in productive activity), or because both of these factors—and sometimes others—coincided.
The choice of travel dates has therefore never been a trivial matter. However, time passes, circumstances evolve, and new trends emerge that alter existing situations. In the tourism and travel sector, checking the calendar before choosing when to travel—or even before choosing a destination—has gained increasing relevance. This is because the reasons for travelling seasonally (at a particular time of year) or punctually (at a specific moment) have multiplied exponentially. Today, this destination–date combination has become a powerful tool that travel agencies can use to design and offer innovative trips that are, as intended, differentiated from those offered by competitors.
A fundamental element in designing and offering appealing trips that take destination and date into account is festivals, celebrations, and traditional ceremonies. These are understood as any event intrinsic to a culture that helps reveal its aspects and characteristics and that has been celebrated for a long time, always reflecting traditional features, traits, and components. Many of these events have a religious character—for example, Day of the Dead in Mexico; the Arbaeen pilgrimage in the Muslim world, specifically within Shiite Islam; Pesach or Jewish Passover; the Kumbh Mela of the Hindus—which, moreover, does not take place every year but every few years, thus enhancing its nature as an occasional journey; Timkat or Ethiopian Epiphany; Baisakhi among the Sikhs, also in India; or, closer to home, Holy Week in various Spanish cities.
Other celebrations have little to do with religion and are instead linked to different aspects—for example, Carnivals around the world; the various “New Years” (Chinese, Korean, Persian, Berber, Ethiopian, etc.) that exist across the planet; celebrations coinciding with solstices or equinoxes that have traditionally been observed by different civilizations—Holi in India being a case in point; celebrations of independence or other political milestones of a country; or simple festivities of the most diverse nature—such as St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland, Oktoberfest in Germany, or La Tomatina in Spain, to name just a few.
Distinct from the above, due to the absence of tradition and the lack of an obligation to transmit elements specific to a culture—although inevitably some are often conveyed—are what we might call modern events. These include both artistic and sporting events: sporting competitions, music festivals, concerts, theatre festivals, operas, film premieres, or periods during which a theatrical production remains on the playbill.
Even within sporting events, seasonality or punctuality can manifest in various ways: the duration of a particular sport’s season (for example, the English Premier League, Spain’s La Liga, or the Champions League in football; the NBA in basketball; or the Top 14 in rugby); the staging of a tournament or competition lasting several weeks (such as the tennis Masters Series or the Six Nations rugby tournament); or the presence of an event that takes place on a single day (such as Formula 1 Grands Prix or the Super Bowl).
But it is not only human activity; nature itself offers reasons, occasions, and circumstances to travel on specific dates or at least during certain times of the year. This is the case with flower blooms (the cherry blossoms in Japan are world-famous, but there are also lavender blooms in Mediterranean countries, rhododendrons in Bhutan, or jacarandas in southern Africa); animal migrations (the great African migration between Serengeti and Maasai Mara national parks; turtle nesting seasons; whale-watching seasons in various locations around the world; the migration of monarch butterflies in Mexico; or South Africa’s Sardine Run); astronomical events (such as the northern lights, meteor showers, or eclipses); or even, for those willing to assume certain risks, natural phenomena (such as volcanic eruptions, as well as the practice of storm chasing, which seeks to experience what it is like to be close to such natural events).
As can be seen, the factors and motivations that lead one to consider a journey increasingly shaped by seasonality and punctuality are numerous and significant. In the pursuit of differentiation and added value, travel will seek not only the best destination but also the most appropriate moment in which to experience it.
Author: Sergio Gonzalo Rodrigo
Travel advisor, travel writer, and researcher of travel as an activity, a phenomenon, and a discipline.
The authors are responsible for the choice and presentation of the facts contained in this document and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of Tourism and Society Think Tank and do not commit the Organization, and should not be attributed to TSTT or its members.
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