Hawaii visitor arrivals, spending continue climbing

The number of tourists coming to Hawaii continues to grow and they are spending more money, according to the latest count from the Hawaii Tourism Authority.

Visitor spending grew by $110 million to $1.22 billion for the month of February from a year earlier. The HTA said visitors are spending an average of about $198 a day, per person. An estimated 675,517 tourists visited Hawaii last month, a 7.8 percent increase from February 2012.

Among Hawaii’s top visitor markets, arrivals by air from U.S. West grew 8.2 percent to 239,963 visitors. U.S. West total visitor spending is up 19.7 percent to $382.5 million. U.S. East arrivals (144,594 visitors) were comparable to February 2012. Total U.S. East visitor spending rose 8.2 percent to $311.7 million.

Arrivals from Japan rose 3.9 percent to 118,926 visitors last month.

Canadian arrivals increased 1.7 percent to 65,304 visitors last month. Total Canadian visitor expenditures were  at $136.9 million, 1.2 percent higher than in February 2012. Arrivals from other markets increased 26.4 percent, while their spending rose 11.8 percent to $181 million in February.

Arrivals by cruise ships increased to 25,442 visitors, up 44.7 percent from February 2012 .

The number of Chinese visitor tripled in the February comparison to 14,097. The Tourism Authority said the visitors from China came here to take advantage of the Lunar New Year holiday, which fell in February this year.