Last updated at 16:19, Tuesday, 31 July 2012

A POTENTIALLY costly gaffe by one of the internet’s biggest travel sites could be the catalyst for the start of a beautiful new friendship.

Printscreen of Tripadvisor's Lake District/Nuneaton gaffe.

Last week it emerged that anyone using TripAdvisor’s online map to drive to the Lake District would have ended up some 170 miles off course – in Nuneaton.

The Midlands town of about 70,000 people is renowned for its flat terrain and stands in stark contrast to the famed peaks and lakes of Cumbria. Local tourism operators were initially angered as the blunder came at a time when they were trying to mitigate the impact of the Olympics on the annual summer trade.

But with TripAdvisor having made a speedy amendment to its website, the Lakes Hospitality Association saw an opportunity to turn the mistake into a positive.

The LHA has invited Nuneaton to become an “honorary town” of the Lake District in a bid to facilitate a greater flow of tourists between the two locations.

LHA president Jonathan Denby said TripAdvisor had inadvertently done the region a favour by paving the way for the new relationship with its error.

Mr Denby said he would meet with Nuneaton town centre manager Alan Ottey today and the two planned to lobby Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Rail to start stopping at Nuneaton.

“Like the Lake District, Nuneaton is right next to the M6 and the main west coast rail line,” he said. “We want to adopt Nuneaton as an honorary part of the Lake District because Nuneaton has so much to offer that we can’t. When we are being deluged by another downpour they are often basking in bright sunshine and when we sometimes get a little irritated from non-stop Wordsworth and daffodils and Beatrix Potter and Peter Rabbit, they have the novelty of George Eliot and Middlemarch.

“Whereas we are all mountains and hills, they have lots of lovely flat spaces. We complement each other beautifully.”

Mr Denby said he was glad everything appeared to have worked out for the better, although he was initially concerned TripAdvisor’s mistake would strip the Lakes of valuable tourists in a difficult year.

He said: “We were a little bit worried that people were going to put this map into their sat-nav and head off blithely and be a bit surprised when they reached their destination.”

First published at 16:11, Tuesday, 31 July 2012
Published by http://www.nwemail.co.uk