Only 37 miles southwest of Hong Kong, Macau is another superstar Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China, and like its neighbor is growing by leaps and bounds, via massive gaming and hospitality projects. Casinos are big business here, and for planners that means that there's a well-developed infrastructure for meetings of all sizes.
The center of gaming and upscale hotels is at the Cotai Strip. Properties here that are opening soon or have already opened include the Four Seasons, Sheraton, St. Regis, Shangri-La, Traders, Hilton, Conrad, Fairmont, Sands, Wynn, and Raffles brands. Las Vegas Sands Corp. owns each property and operates the casinos and entertainment in each hotel.
The Venetian Macao, scheduled to open in August, is destined to become a conventions mainstay. It will feature nearly 3,000 all-suite rooms, 1.2 million square feet of meeting and exhibition space, a 15,000-seat arena, and more than 350 premium retailers in a luxurious retail mall.
Just announced in late May, another mixed-use casino complex, Macao Studio City, is set to open in 2009 on the Cotai Strip. A 968-room Marriott property will be one of the anchors of the new project.
It must be noted that the frenetic pace of development on the Cotai Strip could slow because of new visa regulations for Chinese visitors--a big part of the gaming market in Macau--and a possible overabundance of casinos.
Another good meeting site is the Macau Tower Convention and Entertainment Center, attached to the iconic Macau Tower. There are three levels of meetings-only space in the convention center: a theater, an exhibition hall, a banquet hall, and a grand hall that can be divided into eight smaller rooms. There's also an on-site entertainment district with restaurants. If that's not exciting enough, attendees can bungee jump from the main tower--talk about extreme team building!
Outside the casinos, Macau has two main areas where attendees can soak up the area's vibrant nightlife and experience the unique blend of Chinese and Portuguese culture--Macau was a Portuguese territory until 1999.
The Docks is a great place to fill up on food and visit local watering holes. The nightclubs and bars here often have live music from around the world, and this is probably the best neighborhood to catch a Portuguese folk dancing show.
Fisherman's Wharf is a relatively new tourist district with plenty of open-air dining, shopping and cultural sites. The Lou Lim Iok Garden is a 19th century Chinese garden, and the Museum of Macau and St. Paul's Church are both near Fisherman's Wharf.
Getting to Macau is easy. Many travelers fly into Hong Kong and take a quick hydrofoil trip to Macau, while an increasing amount are flying directly to Macau International Airport. The airport has more than 15 airlines that connect with cities all over Asia. Once in Macau, hydrofoils zip up and down the peninsula and to the nearby islands, and the bus system is one of the best and easiest to use in the world.
Per square mile, Macau just might have more to offer planners than anywhere else in the world--big things really do come in small packages.
