Two years after the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004, Patong Beach - the throbbing nightlife hub of Phuket, Thailand - is not just up and running, but booming.
Thai boxers in silk shorts glide past on a flatbed truck, as loudspeakers play the theme from Rocky. Hordes of pink-tinged Swedes, rosy Germans and par-broiled Australians surge up and down Thaweewong Road, bargaining for knock-off Chloé handbags. Beautiful massage girls wave from their lemon grass-scented storefronts, while tuk-tuk drivers lean against their tin-can taxis. An unbroken chain of small waterfront hotels offer panoramic views and birdbath-sized plunge pools; up on the mountainsides, the fairy lights of the big hotels sparkle with luxurious intent.
Signs of the tsunami are few and far between: A gutted and sagging hotel at the edge of town has yet to be rebuilt, but promises luxury units in the unspecified future; blue and white evacuation signs dot the beach, bearing pictograms of a stylized person running uphill to escape a high-curving wave.
Thailand's Andaman coast is a sterling example of international tourism's recent hardiness. Phuket, the region's top draw, was swamped by the tsunami, which killed 8,000 people on the island - including 2,448 non-Thais from 37 different countries - and devastated beachfront towns and resorts to the tune of $1.6-billion. But the island is now a comeback success story, its liveliness and tropical beauty reclaimed from the sea, with many hotels and resorts reporting 95-to-100-per-cent occupancy during this holiday high season.
Phuket is not alone in its resilience. Over the past several years, several top-flight destinations - from hurricane-ravaged Cancun to cataclysmically flooded New Orleans to terrorized New York - have, like Thailand, rebounded from devastation with startling swiftness.
How is it that these destinations are able to bounce back so effectively? Part of the reason is instinctive: The human response to being knocked down is to get up and fight back, says British-based Simon Anholt, who advises governments on brand management in tourism.
Another explanation is economic: The larger the role tourism plays in the local economy, the more a destination will be motivated to rebuild and lure visitors to return, says Gabor Forgacs, an assistant professor of hospitality and tourism management at Toronto's Ryerson University.
The key actions that must be taken quickly are the repair of damaged infrastructure, the offering of incentives to attract cost-conscious tourists and the rebuilding of confidence among consumers and the travel industry, says Sydney-based David Beirman, a tourism crisis and recovery management specialist and author of Restoring Tourism Destinations in Crisis.
One month after Phuket was hit by the tsunami, for example, repairs were well advanced, and the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) was implementing a recovery marketing campaign focusing on discounts and value-added special offers, he says.
In turn, what makes travellers eager to return to destinations only recently at risk? According to Anholt, they return because of the positive image of a place they developed over many years. Media coverage of a disaster can even reinforce that image, he adds, as it usually includes lavish TV footage of what the area looked like before, making people want to go there.
Travellers will return quickly if they believe a destination offers something unique, and that the disaster was a one-time event, says Ryerson's Forgacs. However, they still need to believe that the destination is safe. Vacationers were a long time going back to popular Adriatic beaches after fighting ended in former Yugoslavia, and tourist figures for the Middle East remain low because of continuing violence.
Just getting a product's name before the public can be positive, regardless of the circumstances, Anholt says. Bookings for now-defunct ValueJet, for example, actually increased after TV coverage of the crash of one of its planes in the Florida Everglades in 1996.
While bargain-hunters are the first to return to battered destinations, their presence attracts more high-spending tourists, Anholt adds. "There is nothing better for making tourists return than having tourists return."
Here, then, are four of the tourism industry's most striking comeback stories:
Thailand Three days after the tsunami hit Patong Beach, Penny Mastrogiannis, who specializes in booking Asian tours for Montreal's Exotic Tours, says she was "receiving pictures that showed the beaches were already cleared. The army went in and went to work right away."
The speed of the recovery also owed a lot to the fact that Patong Beach "already had a very strong infrastructure," says Nikki Busuttil, director of communications for Thailand's Amari Hotels and Resorts chain, which owns the Amari Coral Beach Resort in Patong. "The people rallied together to help one another. Life was rebuilt, and the opportunity was taken to improve many aspects - resorts were renovated, improvements were made. Beaches became even more beautiful than before."
Addressing the resilience of international travellers themselves, Kayla Shubert, a spokeswoman for the TAT's Toronto office, points out that, in the wake of the tsunami, "Canadians didn't cancel their bookings, they just changed destinations within the country - they chose a different beach resort."
Indeed, Thai government statistics showed a 17-per-cent increase in the number of Canadians arriving in Thailand in January, 2005, over those arriving in January, 2004.
The resurgence of Phuket tourism is clear. At the Amari Coral Beach Resort, for example, 95 per cent of its 197 rooms were occupied even before the busy holiday rush. Executive chef Alexander Mack vividly recalls Boxing Day, 2004: "The first wave, which was 10 to 11 metres tall, came and went very fast. Cars, trucks, boats came floating by."
But what Mack calls "the whole mopping-up process" began almost immediately. The Amari reopened on July 1, 2005, and "after two weeks we were at 50 per cent [occupancy] By fall, we were at 95 per cent."
At the Burasari, a small boutique hotel, manager Somphop Prattransanti leads a visitor across the central courtyard past the swimming pool. "Everything - computers, furniture, kitchen supplies - was in the pool" after the tsunami hit, he says. Although just steps from the clamorous waterfront, the Burasari feels secluded and tranquil. "We were far enough back from the sea that the damage wasn't that severe." A new "executive" wing of 97 rooms has just been added to the hotel's 90 original rooms, and according to Mr. Prattransanti, occupancy is at 90 per cent, even in the off season. New York
A little more than five years after terrorists flew two planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center - killing more than 2,700 people and blanketing Lower Manhattan in a cloud of toxic dust - New York has brushed itself off and is well on the way to recovering its cocky self-confidence.
"Lower Manhattan has moved beyond recovery and toward full-fledged expansion," says Eric Deutsch, head of the Alliance for Downtown New York. Rents and real-estate prices are soaring as new businesses are pushing commercial vacancy rates into single-digit territory.
But perhaps the most remarkable comeback has been in the city's vital tourism industry. By the end of this year, more than 44 million visitors will have poured close to $28-billion into the local economy, according to New York's tourism authorities - a dramatic rebound from the post-attack lows of 35.5 million visitors spending $16.3-billion in 2002.
The site of the twin towers and 9/11 memorials have themselves become tourist attractions and the city continues to offer a rich variety of cultural events. Shows range from an examination of the influence of African-American culture on fashion at the Museum of the City of New York running through Feb. 19 to a showcase of gold treasures through Aug. 19 at the American Museum of Natural History.
In the year after 9/11, the city launched a vigorous advertising campaign to lure tourists back and hotels dropped their average rates to almost half of what they were in 2000. In the end, it wasn't such a hard sell after all - the Big Apple's cultural, entertainment and shopping attractions are hard to beat.
The city's hotel-occupancy rate soared to 85.5 per cent in 2005 from 73.4 per cent in 2001, and is expected to be higher this year. New upscale hotels - such as Affina Gardens, Hotel QT and Dream Hotel - have been added to an already rich inventory.
New Orleans
Sixteen months after Katrina pounded New Orleans and breached levees flooded 80 per cent of the city's homes, the Big Easy is building back its vital tourism business.
Cruise ships - a $260-million-a-year industry before Katrina - are returning to the city and its new $43-million ship terminal. Leading the way is the Norwegian Sun, scheduled to make 26 calls through April 15, 2007, as it embarks on cruises to Central America and Mexico. Gary LaGrange, president of the Port New Orleans, expects the city's cruise business to be about 75 per cent of pre-Katrina levels by the end of this year.
Downtown New Orleans and the French Quarter occupy high ground and avoided the worst of the flooding, and have been mostly open for business since shortly after Katrina. A surge in visitors is expected here this New Year with entertainment in Jackson Square, fireworks over the Mississippi River and the last minutes of the year counted down with a lighted gumbo pot dropped from atop the Jax brewery.
The city's tourism industry hopes that many of those New Year's revellers will stay on for the return of college football's Sugar Bowl to the city on Jan. 3, when Notre Dame plays Louisiana State University at the newly dressed up Superdome. There are also high hopes for the Mardi Gras parade season, which runs from Feb. 9 to 20.
Cancun
Cancun's recovery from the ravages of Hurricane Wilma, which pounded the Yucatan coast a little more than a year ago, have been so spectacular that the United Nations World Tourism Organization has declared it a model to emulate in future disasters.
The Mexican government paid $24-million to a Belgian firm to vacuum up offshore sand and pump it back to resort-front beaches. About $2.3-billion in insurance claims were filed, and many hotel and resort owners took the opportunity to upgrade the quality of their rebuilt properties and add more condos to the mix of accommodations. The Ritz-Carlton, for example, added a $288,000 Culinary Centre, and Club Med has reopened after a $28-million renovation.
The successful recovery program seems to have spawned a virtuous circle: Consumers have noticed the improvements, and bookings have jumped 32 per cent since last October, sparking a 7-per-cent increase in commercial and chartered flights.
The boom is spilling south along the 110 kilometres of the Yucatan's Mayan Riviera. Since Wilma blew through, 4,000 more hotel rooms have been added along the coast and 3,000 more are in the works for next year.
With a report from Doug McArthur.