If Sunday’s Season 2 finale of “The White Lotus” sent you googling flights to Sicily, well, you’re certainly not alone! Searches for travel to the southern Italian island are up by 50%, according to the mobile travel app Hopper.
During a Tuesday segment of “Good Morning America,” Lara Spencer reported that San Domenico Palace, the 14th-century monastery-turned-luxury hotel where Season 2 was filmed, is sold out for the spring 2023 season. Rooms are averaging at € 3,000 per night for seaside-facing rooms, an all-time high for the resort.
However, it’s not just San Domenico: Demand for hotels on the Taormina Coast, where other scenes for “The White Lotus” were filmed, have skyrocketed. Lodgings are going for $192 per night, on average.
“When we see very popular shows with incredible cinematography like ‘White Lotus’ air, we often see big surges in demand to destinations around the world,” Hopper economist Haley Berg said.
As Spencer noted, similar upward trends took off for the Four Seasons Maui that served as the set of Season 1 of “The White Lotus,” as did searches for Croatia during the final season of “Game of the Thrones.” Even the hugely popular “Yellowstone” is driving up tourism to U.S. National Parks, Spencer said.
“The White Lotus” finale premiered Sunday, drawing 4.1 million viewers in the U.S., a series record. Mike White’s Emmy-winning murder-mystery dramedy stars Theo James, Ethan Sharpe, Haley Lu Richardson, Jennifer Coolidge, Adam DiMarco, Michael Imperioli, F. Murray Abraham, Meghann Fahy, Aubrey Plaza and more.
HBO recently renewed it for a third season, with the location (and future hot tourist destination) yet to be announced.
