Gianyar (Antara Bali) - The number of foreign and local tourists visiting the Monkey Forest at Pekraman Padangtegal village in Bali's Ubud sub-district has dropped drastically, a local official said.
"The number of foreign and domestic visitors to the forest has now dropped to an avarage of 200 per day while it used to be 600 per day," I Ketut Selamat of the Monkey Forest's management, said on Friday.
Usually, during the holiday season, the forest was visited by up to 600 foreign and domestic tourists per day. "Now the holiday season is over, the number of visitors is dropping low," he said,.
He admitted, however, that during the present low visitors' season it was normal for their number to decline. "But we still hope we can still draw at least 400 visitors per day."
Adult tourists who wanted to see the approximately 500 monkeys inhabiting the forest would be charged Rp20,000 and chldren Rp10,000 per person. Balinese people could watch the monkeys free of charge.
He said the income from ticket sales was used by the Pekraman village administration to guard and maintain the forest and its monkeys, and also to finance traditional ceremonies that have to be held from time to time in the forest area.
He said the forest management was cooperating with veterinarians at Udayana University and Wildlife Assessment Agency in taking care of the 500 monkeys. "The cooperation with the veterinarians is necessary to keep the monkeys in good health," he said.
The forest management was also using monkey tamers to ensure the safety of visitors entering the forest. "The monkeys tamers will walk around in the forst to anticipate any possible undesired happening," he said.(*)
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