News / Tourism Board

All treats, no tricks for Tourism Ireland

Blake Wolfe

10-30-2018 10:43 am

Blake Wolfe

Blake Wolfe is an award-winning journalist and editor, who joined PAX after nearly 10 years in Canada’s newspaper industry. In addition to PAX, his work has been featured in publications such as the Metroland Media group of newspapers and the Toronto Sun.

The treats keep coming for Tourism Ireland.

Celebrating the Celtic festival of Samhain – a precursor to Halloween with roots tracing back more than 3,000 years – in Toronto this week, Tourism Ireland’s Dana Welch told PAX that the board expects to welcome a record number of Canadian arrivals in 2019, after cracking the 200,000-mark last year.

“That brings us into a top 10 global market for Tourism Ireland in terms of visitors, and number five in terms of visitor revenue,” said Welch.

More airlift

Aiding the increase of arrivals will be the numerous new flights between Canada and Ireland which were announced or came online in the last year, Welch said. These include the June launches of Air Canada’s Toronto-Shannon and Montreal-Dublin flights; the announcement of WestJet’s incoming Calgary-Dublin service; and the upcoming launch of Norwegian Air’s Hamilton-Dublin route in March.

“With the support of our partners in the travel trade, we do anticipate additional growth coming out of Canada, which is really exciting for us,” she said.

Travel treats

Canadians discovering the roots of their Irish ancestry continue to make up a sizable segment of arrivals, Welch said, with more than 5,000 Canadians tracing their family history back to the Emerald Isle.

Golf fans will have another reason to travel to Ireland as well in the coming year, when the 2019 Open Championship takes place at the renowned Royal Portrush Golf Club in County Antrim from July 18-21. The tournament will be the second Open championship to take place at the club, after the first was held there in 1951.

And with the ‘spirit’ of the season in mind, Ireland has several Halloween-themed travel opportunities on offer.

Named the best Halloween city in the world by USA Today, the Northern Ireland city of Derry hosts a week-long Halloween festival each October, culminating in a parade and fireworks display on Oct. 31.

And for horror fans, Dublin is the home of the annual Bram Stoker Festival, a four-day celebration of the Dracula author and all things vampire-related.