(Bloomberg.com) A treetop adventure course built in Menoreh Hills in 2008 has been turned into a photo park after visitors were seen coming only to take photos and get the perfect Instagram shot.
Kalibiru Tourism Village near Yogyakarta seized the opportunity and decided to convert the zip-lines and treetop platforms into a destination especially made for social media photo-ops. It installed cameras on every point, and photographers were hired to take the photos and advise visitors on the best poses to showcase the beautiful natural background. All images taken are uploaded directly to visitor’s phones.
Kalibiru’s popularity has since soared on blogs and social media sites such as Instagram, WeChat and Facebook. Now, visitors can wait up to 6 hours on popular days to visit the park. A nearby village also built a second photo destination to accommodate the demand. About 7,000 tourists now visit the two sites each week.
Similar photogenic attractions are popping up across Asia as young travelers now compete via social media to show off their experiences. More and more millennials around the continent now consider travel as the new status symbol.
A joint study by Mckinsey & Co., Visa Inc. and the Singapore Tourism Board predicts that spending on international travel by Asian millennials will jump to 160 percent to $340 billion by the year 2020.
“Everyone is looking for that perfect Instagram moment, one-upmanship, with out of this world experiences to get that killer photo,” said Tim Hartnoll, owner and executive chairman of the exclusive Bawah Island eco-resort in Indonesia, where guests arrive by seaplane and use the hotel’s drone to take aerial videos.
“The new generation of wealthier tourists are looking for authenticity and transparency, always searching for those new and exclusive, unexplored locations,” Hartnoll said.
Photos courtesy of Bloomberg.com.