This month alone saw four international cruise ships with some 7,200 travelers cancel their plans to visit Nha Trang, a famous beach city in Khanh Hoa Province, south-central Vietnam, due to local regulations.

In particular, the city expects to welcome over 30 foreign cruise ships carrying tens of thousands of visitors this year, mainly from the U.S. and Europe.

They include large and well-known cruise ships, such as Spectrum of the Sea, MSC Poesia, Queen Elizabeth, and Mein Schiff 5 with 4,000, 2,800, 2,000, and 2,500 passengers on board, respectively.

However, from February 18 to 24, three cruise ships—Queen Mary 2, Seven Seas Explorer, and Nautica with 2,000, 700, and 500 passengers, respectively, scrapped their plans to come to the Vietnamese coastal city.

Most recently, a representative of the Nha Trang Branch of Vietnamese tour operator Saigontourist has confirmed that Spectrum of the Sea with 4,000 travelers, which was scheduled to dock in Nha Trang on Sunday, has canceled its schedule.

Nguyen Quang Thang, director of Tictours International Travel Co. Ltd., said the company had reported difficulty in serving international cruise ships to the Khanh Hoa People’s Committee.

Tour operators found it hard to use over-29-seater vehicles to take tourists to visit Nha Trang City and adjacent areas, such as Vinh Ngoc and Vinh Thanh Communes.

Meanwhile, these areas have many tourism products preferred by foreign tourists, such as ancient houses, communal houses, traditional wet markets, craft villages, and rice fields.

“This has caused losses for local enterprises and Khanh Hoa’s tourism and eroded the interest of tourists, especially those from the U.S. and Europe—desirable source markets of many destinations—in the city," Thang said.

“If the situation continues, more shipping companies may weigh their plans to exclude Nha Trang from their destination lists in the coming time."

The Khanh Hoa People’s Committee last month allowed cars with more than 29 seats each to be issued with tourism badges to be able to enter the downtown area of Nha Trang City during peak hours.

However, no vehicles have been granted the badges since then as their drivers had no certificates of serving tourists.

To remove the difficulties to receive 12 international cruise ships from February to April, Thang and local travel companies proposed temporarily allowing over-29-seater vehicles that serve passengers of such cruise ships to travel on downtown streets in Nha Trang, roads in Vinh Ngoc and Vinh Thanh Communes, and some other roads during rush hours on the days after the arrival of the vessels.

The provincial Department of Tourism should coordinate with training centers to open courses and issue certificates to drivers so that applications for the tourism badges will be completed soon.

According to a leader of the department, drivers and staff on vehicles must complete training courses on serving tourists to get the tourism badges.

The department annually opens such training courses, with the latest one in September last year.

Two similar courses will be launched between March 13 and 18, the departmental leader added.

The Khanh Hoa People’s Committee has also asked the provincial Department of Transport to join hands with the Department of Tourism and other relevant agencies to quickly review and handle proposals of travel companies and propose solutions to the provincial People’s Committee prior to March 3.

Like us on Facebook or  follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!