Ras al Khaimah: The emirate of Ras Al Khaimah (RAK) has been putting itself on the tourist map in recent years through the fast-tracked development of high-end hotels.

Although not as established as neighbouring Dubai and Abu Dhabi, RAK is slowly increasingly its visibility and potential by investing in high-end hotel developments, including nearly two dozen five-star hotels such as Al Hamra Fort and Beach Resort, Khatt Spring Hotel and Spa, Cove Rotana, Banyan Tree Al Wadi and Palace Hotel Ras Al Khaimah.

In 2010, 80,000 people visited the emirate, mostly from the UK, Italy, Germany, Scandinavia, Russia and the UAE. According to Erwin van der Veen, hotel manager at the newly opened DoubleTree hotel, RAK aims to quadruple those figures by 2012 and predicts that by 2021 tourism revenues will account for 20 per cent of income.

Active role

Hilton Worldwide is one of the major international chains that the government is investing in to boost the emirate's visibility.

"The government of RAK is the owner of our properties here with the exception of DoubleTree so the interest is the same for both of us and we work very closely with the government of RAK and owner on promoting the destination in different fairs," Essam Abouda, Hilton's Vice-President of Operations — Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean, told Gulf News.

Hilton entered RAK in 2001 starting with Hilton Ras Al Khaimah, Hilton RAK Resort and Spa, and now Double Tree by Hilton RAK.

The brand also has two hotels in the pipeline: Waldorf Astoria RAK scheduled to open in the first half of 2012 and Hilton Mina Al Arab scheduled to open in 2013.

"The properties are doing quite well. Average occupancy [in the Hilton RAK and the Hilton RAK Resort and Spa] were 70 per cent in 2010 while average occupancy was 85 per cent in the first quarter of 2011," said van der Veen.

"We are looking at almost 10 to 15 per cent growth across all properties in RAK," he added.

According to Abouda, Hilton Worldwide is playing an active role in the promotion of the destination by endorsing the emirate through various travel fairs worldwide