Saudi Arabia is betting $1 trillion it can become the next tourist hotspot

“We got to see the country at the beginning of its opening up," said Ms. Flesher, 65. “But that meant we saw a lot of random things that will not be popular tourist destinations."

Welcome to one of the world’s newest tourist frontiers.

Saudi Arabia, home to Islam’s holiest sites, has welcomed Muslim pilgrims for centuries, but conservative mores and wariness of outsiders have long thwarted the growth of a traditional tourism industry and turned off prospective visitors.

Now, the government plans to spend $1 trillion over the next decade to turn Saudi Arabia into a mass-market tourist destination, part of efforts to diversify its oil-dependent economy. A nascent cruise sector, luxury Red Sea resorts and eco-lodges in the desert are all in the works.

The first Western tourists are getting a more rough-and-ready experience.

Since Saudi Arabia lifted its last Covid-related travel restrictions in March, intrepid tourists have trickled into the country three times the size of Texas to discover its sprawling capital, six far-flung Unesco World Heritage sites and traditional Arab hospitality.

Pioneering travelers are arriving in a country not quite ready for them. Tour guides need to be trained and hotels built. Not all the heritage sites are open full time.

The Saudis are “trying to figure out ‘What are we doing with tourists?’" said Ms. Flesher, who visited with a boutique U.S. tour company.

Add to that, Saudi Arabia’s sensitivity to criticism. A new law prohibits “damaging the reputation of tourism," a vague and ominous ruling in a country whose human-rights record is already a turnoff to many. Authorities executed 81 people in one day earlier this year for various crimes.

In the past month, two Saudi women convicted over social-media posts each received jail sentences of more than 30 years, according to rights groups. The Saudi Media Ministry didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the sentences.

The 2018 killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi also looms large for Western visitors. “The question of Khashoggi always comes up," said Bill Jones, who has led three American tour groups to Saudi Arabia since 2019.

He said he tries to introduce his clients to ordinary Saudis who can tell them what life is like. Still, “Selling Saudi Arabia for us…is never going to be easy."

U.S. intelligence concluded de facto Saudi ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman likely ordered the killing. He denies any involvement. Tourists now taking the plunge in Saudi Arabia say they want to see the country for themselves.

Even as the crown prince was moving to lift restrictions such as a ban on women drivers, authorities jailed women’s rights activists who campaigned for such freedoms. San Antonio startup investor Jean Cheever said she was delighted when her tour group came across one of Saudi Arabia’s women-only driving schools.

She joined the learners as they cruised around a desert parking lot. “They were just giddy," said Ms. Cheever, who is in her 60s. “They were honking at each other, driving around, it was hilarious."

The cloistered kingdom offered its first tourist visas in late 2019. More than 400,000 were issued before the pandemic shut down travel.

As part of plans to create new economic sectors unrelated to oil, Prince Mohammed wants to attract 55 million international tourists annually by 2030, just over half the number that visited France, the world’s most popular destination, in 2019. Nearly 3.5 million foreigners came last year—excluding religious pilgrims—and 6.1 million in the first half of 2022.

A surge in domestic tourism during the pandemic laid bare an infrastructure shortage, so the government committed $4 billion to encourage private-sector investment. Hotel chain Radisson Hospitality Inc., which has 26 properties in Saudi Arabia, now plans to open 20 more within the next three years and Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. wants to add 75 over a decade to its existing 16.

Even though some social strictures—such as a ban on unrelated men and women mixing in public—have been relaxed, alcohol is illegal and the dress code for women restrictive even at most beaches. Temperatures top 120 degrees in summer, and until a few months ago, Yemeni rebels were lobbing missiles and armed drones across the border at cities and civilian airports.

What’s more, Mecca—the country’s most globally renowned site—is only for Muslims.

“That was a bit frustrating," said Ms. Flesher, the retired accountant, who watched pilgrims in Mecca on a TV in her Jeddah hotel room 40 miles away.

Restrictions on drinking and women’s access to some hotel pools are other aspects of a Saudi vacation that visitors found hard to swallow.

Prince Mohammed’s ambitions, imagined with help from Western consultants, are being put to the test. As he emerges from diplomatic isolation following Mr. Khashoggi’s killing, the crown prince’s domestic standing hinges largely on economic promises such as 1 million new tourism-related jobs.

Persuading tourists to visit also tests the kingdom’s ability to attract high-skilled foreigners as it looks to overtake Dubai as the Middle East’s commercial hub.

To meet its tourist targets, Saudi Arabia needs to appeal to the mass market, not just travel junkies and well-heeled retirees.

One of those helping the crown prince in that direction is Jerry Inzerillo, a renowned hospitality and tourism executive from Brooklyn who has launched hotels and resorts from the Bahamas to South Africa.

He was hired in 2018 to run Diriyah, a $40 billion development project that has echoes of Colonial Williamsburg plus luxury hotels and Michelin-starred restaurants. Based around a mud-brick settlement near Riyadh where the ruling family took power in the 1700s, it aims to cement the origin story of Saudi Arabia, for both domestic consumption and international appeal.

“In a world of wonders, there’s only one Diriyah" is Mr. Inzerillo’s catchphrase to market the attraction, which has little name recognition outside of Saudi Arabia.

The 68-year-old is brand ambassador as the kingdom looks to cultivate a more inviting image.

“Saudi has one of the largest gaps between public perception and reality," he said. “We will welcome people and allow them to make up their own mind."

Mr. Inzerillo was one of few Western executives to stand by Saudi Arabia following Mr. Khashoggi’s murder. Even as U.S.-Saudi ties wavered over the killing, he says he spent “abundant personal time" with Prince Mohammed.

Diriyah is now among the most advanced of a string of massive building projects that includes a skyscraper set to stretch for 75 miles. It is closed to the public for renovation, but the aim is to reopen the historic district—one of the kingdom’s Unesco sites—before the end of the year with the goal of pulling in 27 million visitors annually by 2030.