Why You Can Forget French Travel This Year, Tourism Operators Warn

Many French tourism operators fear France–the most visited country in the world–will be off-bounds for international travelers this year. “At the end of May, the government will tell us when we can open again,” says Stéphanie Gombert, director of the historic Château de la Treyne, a Relais & Châteaux gastronomic stay in the Dordogne Valley.

The medieval gem, which looms over the Dordogne River from a clifftop, has 16 period-decked rooms and a Michelin star restaurant. The other “Maître de Maison” here is Philippe Gombert, chairman of the luxury Relais & Châteaux group.

“Annual Closure: Reopening on March 28,” announces the landing page of the chateau’s website. Over a month later, that is yet to happen. “We will open my business in July, perhaps 1-2 rooms at the outset,” Stéphanie Gombert says, “But I doubt for the whole year we will have any international tourists. Maybe some from Switzerland or Belgium.”

Even with the planned easing of the French COVID-19 lockdown in May, hotels, restaurants and bars will stay closed until further notice. Hospitality establishments may open after June 2, in the second phase of “deconfinement”. The government will reassess that closer to the date. From May 11, French people will be able to leave their homes without authorization, and travel up to 100 km instead of the current 1 km limit. This still rules out the possibility of domestic tourism in France.

“Exit Foreign Tourists” To France This Summer

As to other overseas visitors, as French media headlines say, it’s “Exit Foreign Tourists, This Summer.”

“The problem is,” says Gombert, “in June, 85% of my business is international-with guests mostly from Australia, New Zealand, the U.S. or Brazil. So even if they tell us we can open again we miss out on this month. In July-August, 85% of guests are English. “But I have no idea if they will be able to come this year.”

From No.1 Tourist Destination To No Tourist Destination?

From 89 million tourists in 2019, France was targeting 100 million in 2020. Now with corona, all that has fallen by the wayside. “In the absence of foreign tourists, the summer season is lost in advance,” Le Figaro reports, as numerous French hotel and other tourism operators wonder if it’s even worthwhile opening their doors this year. “Even if they end up having the right, they doubt being able to count on sufficient clientele.” 

The hotel industry is facing a dark future. “The year 2020 is a lost year” for the hospitality sector, Roland Héguy, president of the hotel industry union UMIH declared last week.

Impossible To Predict When Domestic Tourism Will Take Off Again

The Dordogne is one of the most sought after holiday areas in France for overseas and French vacationers. Tourism authorities in the southwest region are predicting €93 million losses for the usually busy March to May period. “There are going to be difficult situations for tourism professionals,” warns president of the Departmental Tourism Committee, Sylvie Chevallier. “We know that foreigners will not return in 2020.” The question of whether the French even will holiday in the region in summer is still unclear, she told radio station France Bleu.

With French and European borders still closed indefinitely, travel bans rule out foreign tourism at least for summer holidays. Summer travel can only resume at the outset with “ultra-local” visits, Secretary of State to the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, told parliament last week.

That clientele will help revive the industry, “while the absence of foreign clients will weigh heavily,” reports tourism magazine, L’Echo Touristique. Yet as Lemoyne added, it’s still impossible to “give a horizon or a precise date” as to when tourism will take off again domestically. This throws doubt on the likelihood of far-flung summer vacations in the mountains and on the coast for the French. While almost eliminating the chance of foreigners holidaying in France well beyond that date.

Every summer, the campsites in the southeast Drôme department are booked out almost exclusively by Belgian, Dutch and German tourists–in search of mountains and nature. There’s no certainty they will be able to travel across the border, let alone that French people from other regions will come, one tourism operator told France 3 Television. Even if they do, he said, “local customers will never be able to absorb the possible losses of foreign customers.”

“For the whole tourism sector, it’s a loss of the international season,” director of the UNESCO-listed Château de Chambord in the Loire Valley, Jean d’Haussonville, told France 24 television. 90% of the site’s annual earnings have been lost due to the lack of tourists, since it closed on March 15 for the national lockdown. According to him, it’s almost impossible to envisage how people from abroad will come to Europe this summer. “There’s too much uncertainty at the moment.”