With the flood of tourists expected this year, even in the low season, many hotel owners have said that their winter closure plans are on hold.
The growth in tourist number for 2016 is rising weekly as bookings roar ahead of last year’s total for summer and wintertime breaks.
International tour operators have been booking up thousands of hotel spaces as have individuals keen to enjoy the Algarve sun on and off season.
Sales of rooms for the coming summer season started well early this year and now are running at between 40% and 50% up on 2015. This increase in reservations has led hoteliers to keep their hotels open for longer, for many the closure option employed through the years of austerity, is no longer the cost-effective option.
"This year there are hotels that will not close, or if they do, it will be for shorter periods, because the demand for November 2016 and even March 2017 is now being experienced," said Desidério Silva, the president of the Algarve’s tourism board.
"We reduced closures this year to two months at most, taking the opportunity to give staff a break and undertake maintenance. Our closures are minimised, " said Gonçalo Rebelo de Almeida, administrator of the Vila Gale Group, which has nine hotels in the Algarve.
The closure of the group's hotels in recent years has been from November to February, but with tourism bookings growing all the time, any 2016 closures will be at a minimum.
"We are riding a favourable wave and already have reasonable business booked between May and October. We are well aware that this booking rate is not normal for the Algarve," notes Rebelo de Almeida, emphasising “a big increase in German and Dutch tourists who are making earlier reservations.”
"Tour operators are making big cancellations in some regions and are looking for more traditional destinations and safety within Europe," said António Trindade, President of the Porto Bay Group.
"There are very large problems in Turkey, which, let us not forget, is the second largest European tourist destination, and this year there have been riots."
In view of incidents in Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia, tour operators have cancelled holiday packages in these destinations and are turning to Portugal’s Algarve, Madeira, mainland Spain and the Canary Islands.
"This is not only a phenomenon, but a general trend: there is a search for Christian destinations with people avoiding taking holidays in places where there may be disorder," notes António Trindade with a dgree of controversy, adding that, "you can not continue to have hotels, restaurants, cafes and bars closed in winter."
The Tivoli chain, now owned by the Thai group ‘Minor’, decided this year to keep its six Algarve hotels open all year long.
The Algarve closed 2015 with 16.5 million overnight stays, tourist income of €760 million and 1,200 rounds of golf played.
This year is building up to becoming a record period for tourism in the Algarve with businesses hopeful that they can start to repay debts built up over years of austerity.
