Part of Lesson Plan: Create a Local Travel Guide to Generate Visitor Dollars

Activity Overview / Details

Teacher- How do people know where to travel each year? With people having less money but still wanting to travel there is this concept of a stay-cation.  This means to spend your travel money in your own area. Although we just watched a video of an exotic place, can you think of similar things to do locally?

How many things can you think of here in Morro Bay that would attract local or long distance visitors to come to our area.  Think about families, outdoor people, single people, large groups, elderly travelers, etc.  Why would these people want to come here.? Turn to a neighbor and talk about our own backyard and come up with a list of things that you enjoy doing here which might attract others. 

( OF COURSE, if you are another educator, you could do this same thing with a travel destination oriented to where you live and teach. Here in California, try out the Visit California website to look up destinations from all over the state and the notable travel information for your respective area: http://www.visitcalifornia.com/Explore/)

On the white board, have students come up and write attractions that they came up with that might be of interest to travelers.  Make sure all ideas are on the board before moving on.

Let's look at this list..................beach, rock, hiking, kayaking, fishing, beautiful weather, year around events like the car show, Hearst Castle, wine tasting, great restaurants, fresh fish.

Great -  now lets look at all of our surrounding cities and what they have to offer, such as San Luis Obispo, Cambria, Los Osos, Cayucos, San Simien, Atascadero, and Paso Robles.

What is there to do in these cities? Turn back to your neighbor and make a list of everything there is to do in these cities that you think might attract visitors.

Now we are going to google things to do in SLO county. Here is a list of 180+ free things to do in our county, there are 101 romantic things to do in our county as well as a 2011 calendar of events.  http://www.sanluisobispocounty.com/includes/media/docs/-Free-Things-to-Do-R.pdf   How many of these things were on your list? How many did you forget? How many did you not even know about?

If you were going to make a travel brochure trying to get people to travel to Morro Bay what would you include in it? Lets make one together as a class........

Lodging where to stay? Nice hotels and cheap ones as well

Where to eat? Dining  - where would you reccomend?

What to do?

Theaters and museums

Where to  Shop

What is the History of the Destination?                                    

Climate                                                               

Types of Transportation                                                   

Sports and Recreation

Current Calendar of Events                                               

 Where are the Beaches, Parks, and/or Campgrounds?

Are there Visitor Services?

We need to consider all of this when planning a brochure there needs to be something for everyone to do.