When Icelandair began nonstop flights to Denver in Might 2012, Reykjavik wasn’t essentially a top-of-mind vacation spot. However the route helped introduce 1000’s of Colorado vacationers to steamy soaks within the Blue Lagoon and frosty searches for the northern lights.
Now that Turkish Airways has launched a nonstop flight between Denver and Istanbul 3 times every week, with plans to go as much as 4 occasions every week subsequent month, what is perhaps in retailer for Colorado vacationers?
For starters, Turkish Airways will present discounted “launch” fares beginning at $787 on roundtrip tickets bought by July 3 for journey by way of July 20. Going ahead, the corporate’s route community will present Colorado flyers with an unmatched potential to attach extra simply to beforehand hard-to-reach locations.
If the expertise of what Icelandair did for Iceland tourism repeats, the route ought to open Turkey to extra visits from the area and vice versa.
Turkish Airline’s route community reaches 293 worldwide locations in 130 international locations, plus one other 53 domestically. United Airways, the most important service out of Denver’s airport, reaches 134 worldwide locations in 67 international locations.
“Now we have a really intensive attain in Africa and the Center East,” stated Ahmet Bolat, chairman of Turkish Airways, throughout an interview June 11 after he arrived with a delegation on the inaugural flight from Istanbul. The airline additionally has quite a few routes into Europe and Asia.
“Now we have a really good threshold of worth,” Bolat stated. However that doesn’t imply compromising on service, and the airline is understood for a few of the finest meals out there within the air, based on the Factors Man.
Most layovers on the Instanbul Aiport are underneath 2.5 hours, making it uncommon to seek out individuals napping in chairs or tenting out on the bottom, Bolat stated. When connections take longer than 12 hours, the airline supplies a free one-night lodge keep. For layovers of six to 12 hours, passengers are supplied free excursions through Tourinstanbul to maintain them occupied.
After experiencing the town, which has been constantly inhabited for not less than 2,500 years, the hope is that connecting passengers will need to return and make Turkey a major vacation spot sooner or later, Bolat stated.
The airline additionally provides one thing that others don’t. With a highly-rated well being care system that may present comparable providers at 30% to 60% lower than what’s charged within the U.S., Turkey is selling medical tourism.
For $5,000, Turkish Airways supplies a bundle to U.S. vacationers with a roundtrip flight, every week’s keep in a four-star lodge, metropolis excursions and a head-to-toe medical examination, together with a full-body MRI and endoscopy.
By comparability, the Mayo Clinic’s Government Well being Program runs from $5,000 to $11,000 only for the examination, not together with journey bills.
The brand new flight is the longest out of Denver Worldwide Airport at 6,130 miles, almost 400 miles past the flight between Denver and Tokyo’s Narita Worldwide Airport. It’ll make reaching the nation a lot simpler for expatriates and enterprise vacationers.
“Now we have been ready for this flight for a very long time,” stated Nilgul Karslioglu, a Fort Collins resident initially from Turkey who travels again to Ankara not less than yearly.
She stated a nonstop flight out of Denver eliminates the added hours spent connecting by way of an East Coast gateway or Frankfurt or Munich. She may increase her annual visits to twice a yr.
However Karslioglu, president of the Turkish American Cultural Society of Colorado, additionally acknowledges that the state’s Turkish group, which numbers round 2,000 individuals, isn’t massive sufficient to help the route by itself.
Officers with Turkish Airways and in Colorado are figuring out plans to spice up visitors on each side, not not like what Icelandair did 12 years in the past with its tourism packages.
“Tourism fills the airplane first,” stated Richard Scharf, president and CEO of Go to Denver.
Scharf stated the route ought to pull in vacationers from Salt Lake Metropolis and Albuquerque already used to departing by way of Denver for worldwide journeys. And it may change into common with college and school college students from the Center East and central Asia attending universities within the state.
Count on some tourism packages from Turkish Airways, as nicely. Bolat brainstormed in actual time together with his staff about whether or not to attempt to lure Colorado residents to flee the summer time warmth or winter chilly, asking about how sizzling temperatures reached in Denver throughout the summer time.
Perhaps winter escapes can be higher. Both manner, Turkey’s Mediterranean local weather ought to attraction, whatever the season, he stated.