Award-winning tourism operator forced to shut after 30 years

A well-known Queensland businessman has issued this dire warning about the state’s tourism industry after being forced to close up shop.

A North Queensland tourism operator forced to close after more than three decades has issued a dire warning as the industry braces for more devastation from the coronavirus pandemic.

Michael Trout operated the award-winning Blazing Saddles tour business near Cairns for 31 years before announcing he was shutting up shop for good.

Tourism has been one of the hardest hit sectors of the Queensland economy and few places have endured more hardship than the state’s far north, where one in six jobs before the pandemic was generated by tourism.

Thousands of jobs in the region have disappeared since the end of JobKeeper in March.

Mr Trout spent Monday cleaning out premises and trying to sell many of the horses used to transport more than half a million tourists over the years.

After 31 years, Blazing Saddles co owner Michael Trout is closing his family's horse riding tourism business. Picture: Brendan Radke

The former Barron River Queensland MP said more and more tourism operators in the region – which relies heavily on international visitors without the large population base of the southeast, would go broke in the months ahead without urgent support from all levels of government.

“There’s already been some great operators that have gone out without a whisper and I don’t see me being the last one either,” he said.

“And the collateral damage of not giving enough assistance to the tourism industry is that you’re going to lose so much experience that you just won’t replace.

“We’re going to wake up after this pandemic with part-time operators running tours or businesses a couple of days a week and when you’re trying to compete with southeast Asia, that’s just not going to cut it to lure visitors here.”