Hotel prices around Lake Balaton have skyrocketed, resulting in astounding comparisons which show that two nights at Tapolca, on the northern shore of the ‘Hungarian sea,’ cost about the same as two nights at Singapore’s famous Marina Bay Sands Hotel.
According to the comparison of Hungarian travel blog Spabook, holidaymakers who recently booked a room for two people, for two nights in a four-star hotel in Tapolca, had to pay HUF 109,000 (EUR 315) for their holiday. The pricing of the rooms is put in perspective when one notices that two nights at the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore – the famous luxury hotel with an infinity pool on the rooftop – costs about HUF 115,000 (EUR 333). The reason for the similarities in pricing is not due to price reductions at Marina Bay Sands; rather, it is the prices around Lake Balaton that have risen significantly.
Since then, RTL Klub also checked the prices around the lake and found the same astounding data. A night in Siófok, one of the most popular destinations at the southern shore of the lake, costs HUF 55,000 in a four-star hotel. Meanwhile, about HUF 40,000 would get someone a four-star hotel room in Malta with a seafront view.
According to Tamás Flech, president of the Hotel Union, hotel prices have gone up by 10% on average as compared to the same period last year. Nevertheless, Lake Balaton may come out of the coronavirus pandemic as an economic winner. Hotels are 70% to 90% occupied for the most popular periods of the summer; and the long weekend is supposed to result in a full house for most hotels.
Featured photo by Balázs Mohai/MTI.
