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NATCHEZ — Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson said he is optimistic the changes planned for Spring Pilgrimage by the Pilgrimage Garden Club will present “the best of both worlds.”

Rather than opening its member homes for more than a month and selling individual tickets to each, the PGC plans an abbreviated Spring Pilgrimage calendar, showing homes on Thursdays through Sundays, March 27 through 30 and April 3 through 6. A number of events to entertain tourists and Natchezians alike are planned for those days and the days in between.

The Pilgrimage Garden Club will sell tickets for $100, allowing access to 18 of its member homes for one of the tour weekends. Add tours of Stanton Hall and Longwood for $25 more.

Gibson said he is grateful the Natchez Garden Club will continue to have an extended tour of homes.

“A large number of beautiful homes will be open for all to see during March and April,” he said. “With what the Pilgrimage Garden Club is planning, it will be the best of both worlds. I am very optimistic that the other tour will offer a different and varied approach to Spring Pilgrimage.”

Gibson said Laine and Kevin Berry, who moved to Natchez several years ago and operate Our Restoration Nation, have proven themselves to be very skilled and talented historians and purveyors of new ideas.

“I can’t wait to experience what they are planning. Sometimes change can be a good thing and I look forward to supporting this new take on our very old and beloved tradition — the oldest in the country. We are blessed to have two outstanding garden clubs, offering great and varied experiences for tourists near and far,” Gibson said.

Helen Smith, chair of the Natchez Convention and Promotion Commission, which oversees Visit Natchez, called the Pilgrimage Garden Club’s Spring Pilgrimage changes this year very exciting.

“We are hopeful this will inspire new tourism and will bring more attention to Natchez,” Smith said. “I think it will be a fabulous experience for all who choose to participate and at a bargain price.

“We will still have more than a dozen homes open in town for people who want to come to town other times in March and April. There is very much to see and do here. We have Melrose, the William Johnson House and Bluff Trails and the Indian Village and Civil Rights tours, which bring even more people here. We have so much to learn and see and do on weekends and weekdays,” Smith said.

Darby Short, a Downtown Natchez merchant who owns Darby’s Gifts at 410 Main St., and Darby’s Furniture and Interiors at 520 Main St., said she thinks the changes to the PGC Spring Pilgrimage are “great.”

“I think there are very smart people on that board and this is financially driven. Usually, planned, straightforward, clean, clear events will bring in more dollars than when you spread stuff out,” Short said. “It’s less time that they will have to pay somebody to work the tours…It all sounds real good and real exciting to me. We are living in somewhat of an event-driven society. People like to participate when you do, plan and execute an event. I think the change up is great.”

Jonathan Wood, director of Old South Trading Post, celebrating its 21st year in Natchez, disagrees with the PGC’s changes.

“It was the garden clubs that turned us into a tourist destination. By putting all the homes together at once, you are forcing the homeowners to have more tour guides all at one time. When you spread that out, many people will come and see certain homes on one weekend or two weekends during the period of time that the homes are open.”

Wood said when Natchitoches, Louisiana, expanded its annual Christmas Festival into January, many more people participated,” Wood said.

“Their numbers are up well over 400,000 people because more people get to come and it’s not everybody at once,” Wood said.

He also said limited parking downtown will mean downtown merchants will have fewer shoppers in their stores and that fewer people will stay in Natchez hotels and bed and breakfast establishments.

“When you have limited opportunity, you have limited income potential,” Wood said.

Downtown Karla Brown, who offers shuttle services back and forth between airports and Natchez as well as offers tours, said she’s for anything that brings in tourists.

“Anything to drive up the business is a good thing. Anything they do will help me with driving. If they get the people in, that means I can get them from the airport and drive them around town,” she said. “Any progress we can make is all good. We need to get the ball rolling.”