Echuca-Moama enjoyed another successful long weekend, with guests flocking to town to enjoy the King’s Birthday public holiday.
Mark Francis, executive general manager of Campaspe Port Enterprise, which runs the Port of Echuca Discovery Centre, Visitor Information Centre and Echuca Paddlesteamers, said the long weekend was busy for the region.
“We’ve had a really busy weekend,” he said.
“All of our boats on Saturday and Sunday were full. We actually put on some extra cruises to help meet demand.”
Attractions across the Port of Echuca precinct were packed with visitors throughout the weekend, which Mr Francis was thrilled to see.
“The museum has been phenomenally busy, just people wandering through,” he said.
“We’ve had really good feedback with the experiences. Murray River Paddlesteamers, the horse and carriage, David at Green Pedal, all of those have had good weekends.
“As well as through the broader precinct has been really solid ... it was a nice way to have the long weekend.
“We needed a bit of a boost; so it was nice to see town really come to life.”
The Echuca Moama Steam, Iron and Trades Revival attracted a strong crowd to the region, with around 3200 people attending the annual event.
Moama Market held an event on Sunday for the long weekend, attracting both locals and visitors to their stalls.
Hospitality venues around town were happy with the turnout, including Essen Food and Wine on High St, where plenty of friendly tourists came to dine.
“(Monday) has been the busiest day of the three, but Sunday was busy too,” duty manager Ash Casey said.
“We’ve had a lot of Melburnians and a couple (of people) from Queensland ... everyone’s been really nice and down to have a chat.”
Moama’s River Country Inn owner Jon Marks said they were booked out over the long weekend.
“From all the reports from the people that we had here, the town was extremely busy,” he said.
“They said they haven’t seen that many people around since the last long weekend.
“I think everyone’s done quite well.
“We normally are booked out every long weekend ... we rarely have a bad long weekend.”
Mr Marks noted an interesting change: tourists are booking later than they used to.
“The only thing that’s different is people are booking last minute now,” he said.
“Where they might’ve planned to book a month ago, some of them are coming in the last week.
“I think that’s typical from what I was hearing around the others.”
Seven Beans Echuca manager Tyler Cox felt that last year’s June long weekend had more people in town, but added that this year’s long weekend was still busier than a regular weekend.
“I’d say it’s less busy than it was last year ... at least in this part of town,” she said.
“It’s busier than normal weekends.”
Others felt that this year was the same if not busier, like Mr Francis from the Campaspe Port Enterprise.
“We had quite a bit of the site still impacted by floods last year,” he said.
“So we've obviously got more of it sort of open now, and so certainly that also makes it feel busier.
“It was a really good flow around our site, and certainly the Esplanade and the street itself were really busy.”
Mr Francis said there was a diverse cross-section of the community visiting the region.
“It was definitely a good cross-section,” he said.
“There were certainly a lot families, a lot of family groups around, as well as couples.
“In terms of our preferred visitor profile, what we’ve seen over the weekend is definitely what we’d like to see.”
Echuca has been nominated for the Victorian Tourism Industry Council Top Tourism Town Awards once again. Voting can be accessed at https://www.vtic.com.au/toptourismtown/2024finalists/