Canadians appear to be in staycation mode as trips outside of the country have fallen to levels not seen since October 2010, according to Statistics Canada.
Data released April 20 shows trips abroad dropped nearly 10% year-over-year to 4.8 million in February compared with 5.3 million during the same month a year ago.
“This decrease was largely attributable to the number of same-day car trips to the United States, which were down 7.1% to 2.0 million trips,” Statistics Canada said in its report.
Canadians have had a tougher time justifying day trips to the U.S. since the beginning of the year when the loonie began a steep decline.
The Canadian dollar was worth $0.90 U.S. in February 2014 but a year later it had fallen to $0.79 U.S., according to the Bank of Canada.
While trips to the U.S. have fallen dramatically the past year, Statistics Canada data shows the number of people travelling to countries overseas has increased notably.
Trips overseas jumped 6.9% year-over-year, rising from 832,000 trips in February 2014 to 889,000 trips in February 2015.
Meanwhile, the number trips from other countries to Canada jumped from 2.1 million to 2.2 million over the past year.
Although Brits made the most number of trips to Canada from overseas in February 2015 (58,000), trips from China (46,000) skyrocketed by 27.7% year-over-year.
And as the American dollar gained greater spending power, trips from U.S. residents increased 3.3% from 1.6 million to 1.7 million over the past year.
