Travel to the Cayman Islands is starting to heat up right now, with the destination’s arrival numbers climbing to start the year, Caribbean Journal has learned. The biggest story? The growth has been across the board, with improved numbers from just about every source market to the destination.
For the first two months of the calendar year, the Cayman Islands has welcomed 7.4 percent more stayover visitors, including 44,589 visitors last month (itself a 7 percent jump).
It’s a very strong signal for the destination’s hopes for 2025, according to Deputy Prime Minister and Tourism Minister Kenneth Bryan.
“February’s numbers show that we are on pace for growth in 2025 and we anticipate a strong Q1 for visitation and accompanying revenue from Tourism Accommodation Taxes,” Bryan said in a statement provided to CJ.
So where are all these visitors coming from? Mostly the United States, which continues to dominate travel to Cayman, with 7.4 percent growth last moth alone out of that market. The biggest source of new business? An expansion in seat capacity by JetBlue out of Boston.
Dialing in, it was the northeastern US that saw the most growth, with an 18.5 percent jump compared to last year, and, interestingly, the west coast of the US.
The latter is not a surprise, given the increasing demand for the Caribbean out of markets like California and the lasting impact of Cayman Airways service between Los Angeles and Grand Cayman.
The Canadian market is also seeing strong improvement, with a 10 percent growth rate compared to February of last year, driven in part by Cayman tourism official’s renewed focus on the market.
Even the UK saw notable growth of 5.2 percent, buoyed by consistent flight capacity from British Airways’ flights from London.
