SINGAPORE, 25 April 2018 (updated 27 April): After a decade as a Bhutan travel specialist, Singapore-based Amala is expanding to offer curated travel to signature destinations in Asia and beyond.
Founded in 2009, Amala Destinations has focused exclusively on providing curate journeys to Bhutan.
A decade later, the company is expanding beyond Bhutan although it still remains one of just a handful of companies licensed in both Bhutan and Singapore.
Avid travellers, Ee-Cheng Tseng and Phub Dorji, founded Amala Destinations during a trip to Ubud in Indonesia.
Now, Amala is expanding its curated itineraries to other destinations in Asia and beyond within the category of luxury travel, “but not necessarily extravagant or expensive.”
Options include staying in an eco-friendly guest lodge just outside Gal Oya National Park in Sri Lanka, meeting the owners of a local cheese factory in Italy, or even partaking in a sake tasting with a Shinto priestess in Japan.
“Our clients have been asking us for years to curate journeys to other parts of the world,” said Amala managing director Anand Pereira.
The new journeys from Amala include destinations such as Indonesia and Myanmar in Southeast Asia; India and Sri Lanka in South Asia; Japan and Mongolia in East Asia; Montenegro and Romania in The Balkans; and Italy in the Mediterranean.
A check of the website shows some of the homepage features are still “coming soon” such as a ‘Specials,’ ‘Blog’ and even “Plan your Journey’.
This makes the site very passive in terms of what you can achieve during the website visits. To its credit the profiles of its founders and travel curators are informative and reassuring.
After clicking on the destinations that Amala is now promoting for curated journeys, the information is sparse. Elevating the online browsing experience to the next level of booking and paying for a trip is not possible online. The only way forward is through the old-fashioned telephone.
You cannot browse and click on an itinerary and say “I want that” and then take the planning to the next stage on a payment page that pops up on your mobile.
A few sample itineraries and prices would not go amiss. In the meantime, the starting post is a visit to www.amaladestinations.com.
RESPONSE: Amala clarifies 27 April:
“Regarding “Avid travellers, Ee-Cheng Tseng and Phub Dorji, founded Amala Destinations during a trip to Ubud in Indonesia.” Ee-Cheng and Dorji actually founded Amala Destinations during Ee-Cheng’s trip to Bhutan, where Dorji was her guide.
“Regarding the fact that you can’t book a journey simply through the website, we wanted to clarify that as a company policy, we always ensure that each client enquiry begins with an in-depth conversation with the client, and this can take place either through phone, email, or a face-to-face meeting. This extends to our mission of wanting to create truly bespoke experiences based on our planners’ keen understanding of what the client wishes to experience on their travels, and how we can help them experience it the Amala way.
“The website is in its initial phase post-revamp, we have a fantastic pipeline of content and are working hard with our developers to ensure all the content will go live in the coming weeks.”
