Portugal is seeing a tourism boom, but Hawaii is slow to recover from pre-pandemic numbers. I also have a look at the best travel reward credit cards, the top places for women over 50 to travel this year, and most iconic foods from countries around the world. PORTUGAL TOURISM SPIRALS UPWARD Portugal brought in more money than ever before from tourism in 2023, and the country’s tourism boom shows no signs of slowing down. Tourism revenue increased to more than $36.5 billion CAD in 2023 compared to $30.8 billion the previous year, Secretary of State for Tourism, Read more
Japan
A new study by photo wall art creator StoryBoards revealed that Italy is the most popular destination for a Christmas trip for Americans. The study analyzed travel-related keywords such as “flights”, “restaurants”, “ski facilities”, and more next to 43 popular vacation destinations to discover where Americans are interested in spending their holidays the most. Italy takes the crown with almost 93,000 average searches from September to December 2023. One of the most popular destinations for Americans all year long, Italy can be especially magical during the winter months and Christmas, with markets scattered around the country, as well as offering Read more
Air Canada is boosting its Asia presence. American travelers are eyeing the Caribbean, and Canadians are looking for lesser-known options. Meanwhile, Iceland could be poised for another volcano. Today’s blog post has all sorts of travel news and trends. AIR CANADA EXPANDS ASIA PRESENCE Asia travel has been slow to recover from COVID-19, but Air Canada is betting on the Asian continent in a big way. Air Canada today announced it is strategically boosting its Asia-Pacific network capacity beginning mid-December through to the end of next summer 2024. Among the changes: – Vancouver-Hong Kong operates up to 11 Read more
Victoria, British Columbia has been named the world’s best city in this year’s Conde Nast Travellers’ Readers Choice Awards, while Canada owned the top three picks for world’s friendliest cities. Victoria was third in the friendly category, while Edmonton came second and Calgary was first. Dublin, Ireland was fourth and Quebec City fifth, giving Canada four of the top five spots. I might push for St. John’s or Saskatoon or Regina as the friendliest city in the country if I had a vote, but I suspect Conde Nast readers aren’t as familiar with them as they are with the winning Read more
Comparing search data for three of the major long weekends in Canada – Victoria Day, Canada Day, and Labour Day – Expedia explored which destinations Canadians were most interested in for summer 2023, and which destinations see a shift during the fall months. On the global destination list, Toronto came out on top for all three summer long weekend dates in terms of search interest. Recently, Toronto saw a spike in interest for November 2024 with the announcement of pop-icon Taylor Swift’s long-awaited Canadian tour dates. For the first wave of shows, Expedia reported a 5000% hike in flight searches Read more
