Travel between Canada and other countries, August 2012

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Travel to Canada increased 1.9% to 2.1 million trips in August. This gain was entirely attributable to more US visitors as travel from overseas countries decreased.

American residents made 1.7 million trips to Canada in August, a 2.3% increase from July. This occurred despite a 0.9% decline in same-day car travel as US residents took 627,000 same-day car trips to Canada.

Trips of one or more nights by Americans were up 3.8% from July with gains in overnight car (+4.3%) and plane travel (+3.8%).

Travel from overseas countries to Canada decreased 0.2% in August to 375,000 trips.

In August, 8 of the top 12 overseas markets recorded decreases in travel to Canada. The largest percentage decrease was in travel from the Netherlands (-3.4%), while both France and Australia recorded declines of 3.2%. Travel from Hong Kong and Japan made the strongest gains at 5.0% and 4.4% respectively.

In the opposite direction, Canadians took 5.4 million trips abroad, a 0.3% decline from July. This was the result of 0.4% fewer trips to the United States by Canadian residents.

Canadians made 2.7 million same-day car trips to the United States in August, down 0.6% from July. There was also a 0.2% decline in overnight travel to the United States. Although overnight car travel rose 0.7%, it was not enough to offset the 1.2% decrease in overnight plane travel.

Canadians also made 791,000 trips to overseas countries in August, up 0.2% from July.