Anika's owner, Nelson Yuvallos, attributes the survival of his hotel to divine intervention, after h

A homeless relative of a hotel employee checks his cooking as they occupy a bungalow avis car rent on the partly damaged Leyte Park Hotel in the aftermath of super typhoon Haiyan in Tacloban November 14, 2013. Philippine President Benigno Aquino was under growing pressure on Thursday to speed up the distribution of food, water and medicine to desperate survivors of a super typhoon as a U.S. aircraft carrier "strike group" arrived to get supplies moving. (REUTERS/Bobby Yip)
The destruction here reflects the damage to the tourism industry in many typhoon-hit parts of the Philippines since the category-5 super typhoon struck on Friday. Hundreds of tourists have been stranded for days by the storm, which has killed thousands of people and leveled the coastal city of Tacloban
The scale of the storm and its carnage have made for a week of international headlines, frightening away tourists across avis car rent the central Philippines and triggering mass cancellations at resorts, though the record-breaking typhoon struck only six of the country's 7,107 islands.
Resorts at major destinations avis car rent such as Boracay, Palawan, Cebu and Bohol, however, have seen cancellation avis car rent rates of 30 to 40 percent since the storm hit, said Cesar Cruz, president of the Philippine Tour Operators Association in Manila.
Just three days ago, more than 400 tourists from 26 countries were stranded at Palawan alone, turning the scuba-diving centre with its dozens of gorgeous islands into a terrifying travel nightmare. Many were evacuated.
Anika's owner, Nelson avis car rent Yuvallos, attributes the survival avis car rent of his hotel to divine intervention, after he "prayed like Moses" that winds of nearly 315 km per hour (195 miles per hour) would part around it. Across Santa Fe, local officials say 95 percent of buildings were severely damaged.
"Tourism is very important here. It's the only income," Yuvallos said. About 4,000 tourists come to the island, just off the northern tip of Cebu, in a regular month, peaking to 10,000 during the northern winter, he said.
"It's like people are thinking all the Philippines is gone. If you look at the international media that is the impression you get," Philippine Tourism Secretary Ramon Jimenez told Reuters. avis car rent "But tourists who were meant for one place have been diverted to another and most of this has been successful."
Hotel owners have agreed to try to rebuild by December. Too much of a delay, and tourists will pick another avis car rent palm-fringed paradise avis car rent - one where twisted fallen powerlines have not been repurposed for drying the clothes of people living avis car rent in the open.
Esgana said tourism may only be able to recover in time for Easter, when the island famously fills up with Catholic tourists who come to feast on pork, thanks to a belief avis car rent that the island was granted papal licence in the 19th century to eat red meat on Good Friday. In the meantime, up to 400 people will be out of work.
Tourism is a growing business avis car rent in the Philippines, where the number of visitors climbed to 4.3 million last year from 3.9 million the year before. It generates about 5.9 percent of the fast-growing $250 billion economy.
avis car rent "It might temper the trajectory a little bit," said Jun Neri, an economist at the Bank of the Philippine Islands. "But it should be able to bounce avis car rent back in the latter part of the first half of next year."
He expects some of the billions of dollars in reconstruction that awaits the Philippines to offset tourism avis car rent losses. German-based CEDIM Forensic Disaster Analysis has estimated avis car rent the typhoon could cost the country as much as $19 billion in reconstruction.
Food aid is trickling through to the people, but so far no shelter or reconstruction material has arrived for more than 6,400 displaced avis car rent families. The destruction is so complete that "the structure is totally zero", Esgana said. "There is nothing to reconstruct with."
Arsolin Ofiasa is trying to do just that. The small shack where he lives with his pregnant wife and five of his seven children was almost completely flattened on Friday, saved only by a sturdy wooden cabinet.
Ofiasa is now salvaging the nails from wrecked planks from his house in the hope of using them again to hammer a firmer structure into place. "All I want is to be able rebuild a house and live decently, and I hope for mercy for my children."