Tourism companies have projected an increase of 8-10 percent in tour bookings for the National Day holiday on September 2 compared to the same period last year with outbound tours posting higher growth, The Saigon Times Daily reported.

Fiditour expected bookings of its outbound tours during the holiday to grow 10 percent. This year, guests make early bookings for the tours during the National Day holiday and Japan, the Republic of Korea, Australia, Europe and Southeast Asian countries are among their destinations of choice.

According to travel agencies, guests often register domestic tours for the upcoming holiday later than outbound tours and many people will make decisions until the end of August. Bookings for the trips within Vietnam are forecast to rise 8 percent this year.

As this year’s National Day holiday falls on Tuesday, many tourists favour the trips of two to five days, with departures on Thursday or Friday of the previous week, to take advantage of the weekend, according to Saigontourist Travel Service Company.

As for the outbound tours, Saigontourist said customers prefer trips to Southeast Asian countries because of affordable prices and abundant options.

For example, tours to Thailand during the holiday cost 6 million VND for guests in Ho Chi Minh City and from 8 million VND for those in Hanoi.

For the inbound tours, people in Ho Chi Minh City can book the trips to Da Lat, Nha Trang, Phan Thiet or to the Mekong Delta with prices ranging from 1.85 million VND to 3.1 million VND. The prices of tours to Hanoi, Ninh Binh, Ha Long, Hue, Ba Na, Hoi An, Phu Quoc Island and Con Dao Island are from 5.5 million VND.

Vietnam is banking on domestic tourists to boost the fortunes of the tourism industry, especially in terms of ensuring its stable growth.

According to data released by the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT), domestic tourists reached 23.4 million in the first half of 2014, a year-on-year hike of 6.9 percent, bringing the country’s total tourism revenue in the reviewed period to 125 trillion VND (5.87 billion USD), up 22.5 percent from last year.-VNA