For the first half of the year, tourists from the United States and Canada continued to dominate. US travelers accounted for 31.9% of the total non-resident foreign arrivals, and Canadians were 20% of the total. Some 482,148 tourists came from the United States, up 8.9% over the previous year. From Canada, some 302,159 visited, up 7% over the previous year.
Some 42% of the visiting tourists were from Europe. Among the Europeans, the strongest inbound markets are those from France (176,840), Germany (110,133), Spain (97,688), the UK (90,861) and Italy (65,445). Spain showed a vigorous 40.7% growth, reflecting the addition of two discounter airlines ? Air Madrid and Air Plus. The UK market was also up, with a 41.5% increase. France increased 4.1%. But Germany and Belgium showed a 8.3% and 33.4% declines, reflecting lack of availability of attractively priced airfares for those routes.
Some 2.5% of total visitors came from Central America and the Caribbean.