Tulip Festival, Dows
Lake, Ottawa
Photo: Claudiu Carter and Dara Greenberg
After the 10th consecutive year of increase, overnight travel to Canada—trips
lasting at least one night—again reached a
record level in 2002. Canada
hosted 20 million overnight international travellers that year—the highest
annual level in the 30 years that international travel data have been
collected. This placed Canada
7th worldwide as a tourist destination, an increase from 11th place in
1995 and 10th in 1996.
Americans continue to be Canada's
largest group of foreign tourists, making up 81% of the foreign travel
market. In 2002, Americans took 16.2 million overnight trips to Canada,
outnumbering Canadians travelling to the United States
for the fifth year in a row. Almost half of all Americans coming to Canada
visited Ontario, while 22% headed for British Columbia. For 14% of Americans,
the province of Quebec was the destination of choice and for 7%, it was
the Maritimes. Americans travelled to Canada
for various reasons: 60% were taking a holiday and 19% were visiting friends
or relatives, while 12% had come on business.
Street in St. John's, N.L.
Photo: Gord Baldwin
At the beginning of the 1990s, overseas tourism markets, and particularly
those in Asia, were growing. Asian markets grew 76% between 1990 and 1996,
but fell for the next two years, possibly as a result of the Asian financial
crisis. The proportion of overnight trips to Canada
from countries other than the United States
reached a peak of 26% in 1996. In 2002, this proportion
fell back below the 20% mark. About 3.9 million tourists from outside
the United States came to Canada
in 2002. This represented a decrease of 12% from 2000, the best year on
record.
More travellers from overseas chose Ontario as their destination, but
their proportion was much lower, at 32%, than the corresponding proportion
for Americans (46%). Other popular destinations were British Columbia,
Quebec and Alberta, as these provinces welcomed 27%, 18% and 15% of overseas
tourists, respectively. Compared with American tourists, overseas travellers
were more likely to come to Canada
to visit friends or relatives (28%).
Airplane
Photo: Comstock
For their part, Canadians are a well-travelled people, both within Canada
and to other destinations. In 2002, Canadians packed their bags and made
95.2 million overnight trips within Canada.
The vast majority of these trips (80%) were to destinations within the
same province.
When Canadians leave the country, a trip to the United
States is the most popular choice. We made 13 million
overnight trips there in 2002, a 4% decrease from 2001. In 2002, the most
popular states to visit were New York (12%), Florida (9%), Washington
(9%), Michigan (7%) and California (5%). The longest vacations were spent
in Florida, where the average stay was 20.8 days, followed by Arizona,
at 17.6 days, and Hawaii, at 14.1 days.
Canadians' thirst for new adventures is evident in the dramatic rise
in the number of trips to overseas countries. In 1991, only 13%
of travel by Canadians was to overseas destinations. In 2002, that
proportion was 27%. The most popular destinations for Canadians travelling
overseas in 2002 were the United Kingdom
followed by Mexico, France
and Cuba. Throughout most of
the 1990s, Canadian overseas travel expanded at a faster rate than travel
within Canada or to the United
States. With the growing number of seniors, this
trend is expected to continue and possibly intensify. Seniors tend to
embark on longer trips and travel 'out of season,' since they are not
constrained by the school year or a workplace schedule.
