Newscasts - Canadians vacationing closer to home as they ditch US travel

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25/07/2025 20:13

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Source: 'Reuters - General news videos'

Description: Some Canadians are scrapping plans to travel south of the border for vacation in a bid to stay local after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to annex Canada and imposed a series of tariffs on Canadian goods. Olivia Zollino reports.

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Video Transcript:

If you ask Canadians about whether they plan to travel to the US for vacation, you may get an answer that reflects a newfound desire to stay local.

With everything going on in the US, I feel like a lot of Canadians kind of want to stay home.

I won't be going to the US

No.

Recent numbers back up the sentiment. A Bank of Canada survey this week showed that 55% of Canadians plan to spend less money vacationing in the United States this year. And a survey by TD Bank showed 64% of Canadians polled planned to travel within the country. The shift started earlier this year when US President Donald Trump threatened to annex Canada and imposed a series of tariffs on Canadian goods. That has spurred a ‘Buy Canadian’ movement, boycotting US businesses, and in turn, avoiding travel south of the border.

As we look at Canadians traveling south, we are seeing a decline of-

Joe Amati is from Destination Canada, a government agency that promotes Canadian tourism.

We've seen over the course of the first quarter of 2025, a 4% increase in Canadians traveling domestically, taking their hard-earned money and spending it in their own backyards to celebrate and enjoy all the authentic natural beauty that Canada has to offer.

The number of return trips from the United States made by Canadians via air travel fell 17% in May from a year earlier, according to Statistics Canada. The number of such trips made by car fell by 37% that month. Torontonian Divya Mohan is among those who decided to cross the US off her travel list in favor of destinations in Canada.

US was something we had planned for last year, but with the recent changes to travel advisories, the general climate around travel to the US, it just didn't seem like it was the right time for us to go.

But traveling within Canada can be expensive. Domestic flights to remote locations often cost more than traveling to the United States or even Europe. Still, airlines are seeing rising demand. Air North, which serves the Yukon and Northwest Territories in the country's north said arrivals to the Yukon rose 7.6% from January to June this year. Meanwhile, WestJet suspended nine routes between Canada and the United States in May, citing lower demand.