The idea of a family outing, especially at weekends, would be to visit one of the many luxurious hotels in the central business district where children would enjoy a play date with activities such as swimming, horse riding, dance competitions and much more.

While all this was going on, the parents would enjoy a Sunday afternoon catching up on politics, gossip and life experiences.

But over the years there has been a steady decline in this phenomenon, as families no longer see hotels as the ideal place or venue to spend weekends.

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This begs the question, where do families in Nakuru go to hang out and why is it that many of the luxury hotels are no longer a favourite for many residents?

To get to the bottom of the matter, Mtaa Wangu spoke to a local resident to find out why they do not go to hotels as much as they used to.

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"I often find hotels to be very expensive and in these hard economic times I would rather take my family somewhere that is cheaper and where I can get affordable food and also hotels do not offer amenities such as electric trains and quad bikes which many children find enjoyable these days," Ruth Sarmwei said.

A hotel in Cyprus park.

Photo credit: Bret Sanya/ Mtaa Wangu

One of the alternative areas that have come to replace the luxurious hotels is Cyprus Park, which is one of the biggest recreational centres in Nakuru town, located in the industrial area of Nakuru and offers numerous amenities including inflatable swimming pools, bumper car races, electric basketball games and a virtual reality centre.

With these amenities and many more, most luxury hotels find it hard to compete with these new ultra-modern facilities.

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At the amusement parks children get to learn new skills such as skating, cycling and how to interact and play with each other.

Herbert Mbuthia, an official at Empolos Hotel, says business has been on the decline lately and they depended largely on meetings held in their premises by both government departments and private organisations.

"Most of the time we used to have a large number of people coming to the premises over the weekend, but lately weekends are becoming our slow days as most people choose to go to amusement parks or even if they are visitors coming for the weekend, they would mostly book Airbnb which is much cheaper, so nowadays we depend on organisations booking rooms for retreats and seminars," Mr Herbert said.

These sentiments were echoed by Nakuru Tourism Association chairman David Mwangi during an interview where he said that most hotel owners currently rely heavily on Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events sub-sector to keep them afloat.

This model, commonly referred to as the MICE model, accounts for 80 per cent of hotel business, making it the fastest growing aspect of tourism in Kenya.

The common saying that eras come to an end is a perfect example in this case as people used to flock to deluxe and high end hotels just to enjoy swimming pools, good food, bouncy castles among other things.

But now all this has changed with the introduction of amusement parks which signifies the beginning of a new era in the hospitality industry.

sanyabret@gmail.com

Why Nakuru residents prefer theme parks to hotels

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Bret Sanya