A cherry blossom festival slated to take place in the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong got the final nail in its coffin on Monday, as the organizers decided to cancel the event, despite the schedule being already delayed once.

The festival, initially scheduled for mid-January and later postponed to February 11 in the provincial capital of Da Lat, was eventually called off, for few flowers had reached full bloom when the planned opening was less than a week away, the organizers said.

With the cherry blossoms not ready for the festival, the Lam Dong administration then decided to scrap the event.

Tourists who booked packages to Da Lat mainly to attend the festival will get a refund from tour organizers at their request, Nguyen Thi Nguyen, director of the provincial information department, said at a press conference on Monday.

Individual holidaymakers will also be able to get their hotel deposits back should they scrap their planned Da Lat trip, now that the festival would not take place, Nguyen added.

“We will send urgent dispatches to tour organizers, travel agencies and hotels, asking them to accept any refund requests from tourists who want to cancel their Da Lat trip following the festival cancelation,” Nguyen said.

According to the department head, 85 percent of the rooms at major hotels in Da Lat had been booked on the occasion of the cherry blossom festival.

These cherry blossom trees in Da Lat may never bloom.

According to the festival organizers, the recent unusual and unpredictable weather conditions in Da Lat are to blame for the unbloomed cherry flowers.

As of the end of the first week of February, most of the cherry trees in the famed tourist city had still refused to bloom.

The event was scheduled to take place in the Tuyen Lam tourist area, where only 20 percent of the cherry flowers have bloomed.

The remaining trees may never bloom as they have started producing buds and young leaves.

“If we keep on organizing the event with only a few blooming cherry blossoms, the festival will be of poor quality,” Vu Van Tu, director of the Lam Dong tourism promotion center, the event co-organizer, explained.

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