Participants of the media launch listen to a short presentation of the Cebu pilgrimage tours. | CDND file photo
MANDAUE CITY, Cebu — The Department of Tourism in Central Visayas (DOT-7) is eyeing the development of more pilgrimage tours in Cebu and the rest of the region in the coming days.
“We have a lot of national shrines , cultural treasures, pilgrimage sites,” said Riza Marie Macaibay, the DOT-7 faith-based tourism focal person.
Macaibay said tourists would always want to come in order to pray, ask for blessings, and pay homage to the patron saints of the different churches here.
Initially, DOT-7 in partnership with the Archdiocese of Cebu, already developed two pilgrimage tours here. These are the Southern Cebu Churches Jubilee Tour and the the Marian Pilgrimage Tour of Metro Cebu.
“We decided to develop the tours because Cebu is known as a cradle of Christianity,” Macaibay said during the recent press launch of the two pilgrimage tours in Cebu.
Macaibay said that aside from developing tour routes here, they also engaged in partnership with the Diocese of Tagbilaran for the development of a Marian pilgrimage route in Bohol province that would bring visitors to three churches that were located in the municipalities of Loboc, Loon and Dauis.
“We are also going back to Bohol to develop another circuit in the northeastern part of the province as well as Negros and Siquijor,” she said.
“Our ultimate goal is come up with the national cultural heritage tours of Central Visayas,” she added.
DOT-7 Director Shahlimar Hofer Tamano said they were also partnering with government agencies and other groups to promote Cebu and the rest of the region as an ideal destination for Persons with Disability (PWDs) and senior citizens.
Inspections will be scheduled soon to check the availability of PWD-friend facilities in a hotel in Mactan Island.
“We want to be the hub of this sector and make services available. We want services, hotels, tours to be friendly in general,” he said.
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