Overseas visitors are flocking to the UK in droves – and spending more than ever while they are here.
Overseas visitors to the UK are at their highest level for five years, with 3 million people visiting in June this year, a 12% increase on 2012.
“If this trend continues it would see us welcome one overseas visitor every second of every day of the year,” says Keith Beecham of VisitBritain, that organisation that revealed the new findings.
VisitBritain also found that visitors from abroad are happy to spend plenty of money while on holiday here: they spent nearly £2 billion in June this year, and have spent 13% more in the first half of 2013 than in the same period last year.
“A weak sterling is making the UK increasingly appealing to foreign visitors, who can make their money go further,” says Chris Lee, head of travel at Barclays.
Aside from offering beautiful and varied natural landscapes, Britain is also steeped in history and has no shortage of excellent attractions that make it so popular amongst visitors from all over the world.
In March this year, The Association of Leading Visitor Attractions disclosed that that top five most visited attractions in the country were all in London:
1. British Museum, with 5,575,946 visitors (per year)
2. Tate Modern with 5,318,688 visitors
3. National Gallery with 5,163,902 visitors
4. Natural History Museum with 5,021,762 visitors
5. V&A with 3,231,700 visitors
The most-visited free attraction outside of the capital is National Museum of Scotland, in Edinburgh, which welcomed 1.89 million visitors, meanwhile the most-visited paid for attraction is Chester Zoo in Cheshire.
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