The number of tourists travelling to Ireland from North America increased significantly in the first quarter of the year while visitors from Britain and the EU were also up, figures released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) today have shown.
More than 1.2 million people visited Ireland in the first quarter, a rise of 8.4 per cent on the same period last year.
The number of visitors from the US and Canada increased by 22.7 per cent in the period while visits from continental Europe were 12.8 per cent higher. The number of tourists coming from the UK was up by 6.5 per cent.
The number of Irish people leaving the country up to the end of March was just over one million a rise of 10.6 per cent on the same period last year.