Thekkady wins world’s top emerging destination award

New Delhi : Thekkady, Kerala’s iconic attraction, known for its jaw dropping landscape splattered with rolling hills, dense forests and spice plantations, has been named the world’s top emerging destination.Thekkady won the inaugural Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) CEO Challenge 2015 along with Albay in the Philippines. The destination in ‘God’s Own Country’, which is home to the Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary, bagged the Top Destination award in the second and third-tier cities category, the only category for cities.Albay received the honour in the category for regions, states and provinces. The award, instituted by PATA, was announced in Bangkok today. Thekkady and Albay beat a large number of destinations from around the world to win the award.The PATA CEO Challenge is aimed at utilising the 500,000-dollar award purse to develop and create a digital marketing campaign to showcase the destination to a global audience. Leading global travel site TripAdvisor, the PATA CEO Challenge 2015 partner, will provide its expertise to developing the campaign.