In 2012, EU28 residents made 1.2 billion trips of one night or more. Almost half of these trips (48%) were for holidays and leisure, 35% for visits to relatives and friends, 13% for business and 4% for other reasons. The average trip length was 5.2 nights.
Malta had the third largest proportion of trips abroad at 60%, domestic travel was 40%. Travel by air transport, showed that the highest proportions were observed for residents of Malta at 57%. Water transport was 43%, again one of the highest proportions in the EU. The top 3 destinations for Maltese travellers on outbound trips were: Italy, the UK and Spain.
The most common means of transport for trips was private or rented cars.(65%), followed by air planes (15%), trains (12%), buses (6%) and water vessels (2%). Of the number of total trips, 76% were made within the country of residence (domestic trips), while 24% were made outside (outbound trips).
For these outbound trips, the main destination for EU28 residents was clearly Europe (85.4%), then followed Asia (4.5%), Africa (4.1%), North America (3.8%), Central and South America (1.9%) and Oceania (0.4%). More specifically, the top 3 destinations for outbound trips for residents of the EU28 were Spain, France and Italy.
The highest shares of trips of EU residents within their country (domestic trips) were observed in Romania (95%), Spain and Greece (both 92%), Portugal (90%) and France (89%). On the other hand, the largest proportions of trips abroad (outbound trips) were registered by residents of Luxembourg (97%), Belgium (78%), Malta (60%) and Slovenia (55%).
The average length of stay varied from more than seven nights for residents of Greece (7.5 nights), Cyprus (7.2) and Belgium (7.1) to less than four nights for residents of Latvia (3.1), Finland (3.4), Denmark (3.6) and Hungary (3.7).
Residents of eleven Member States have Spain in their top three outbound destination
In all EU28 Member States, the top destination of outbound trips made by residents in 2012 was a neighbouring or nearby country, except for residents of Romania (Italy was the top destination) and the United Kingdom (Spain).
Among the top three outbound destinations of trips, Spain was among the top three for residents of eleven Member States, Germany of ten Member States, Italy of nine, France of eight, the United Kingdom of seven and Croatia of four.
Cars were the main means of transport for trips in 2012 for all Member States except for Malta, with the highest shares for residents of Slovenia (84% of all trips), Portugal (80%), Spain (78%), the Czech Republic (75%), France (73%) and Hungary (71%).
For air transport, the highest proportions were observed for residents of Malta (57%), Cyprus (45%), Ireland (42%), Luxembourg (36%) and the United Kingdom (28%), and for rail Romania (17%), France (16%), Germany and the United Kingdom (both 14%).
For buses, the largest shares were registered for residents of Romania (38%), Bulgaria (23%) and Estonia (21%), and for water transport Malta (43%), Greece (14%) and Estonia (13%).
These figures come from an online publication, Tourism trips of Europeans, from Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union. This publication has six chapters: characteristics of tourism trips, participation in tourism, top destinations, seasonality, expenditure and intra-EU tourism flows.
Photograph: Alain Salvary