Belgians travelled abroad slightly less in the fourth quarter of 2022, but they have never visited one of the country’s art cities as much as they did in the last three months of 2022, statistics office Statbel said on Monday.
Brussels, Antwerp, Ghent, Bruges, Leuven, Mechelen, Liege, Charleroi and Mons are considered to be Belgium's art cities.
In the last three months of 2022, Belgians booked some 324,000 stays of one or more nights in one of these cities. This is an increase of 96.3% compared to 2019 in the same period (165,000 stays) and 296% compared to 2016 (82,000).
In the top 3 destinations, the cities of art have overtaken the Belgian Coast (303,000 stays in the fourth quarter of 2022, compared to 394,000 in 2019), while the Ardennes remains in first place, with 481,000 trips booked in the fourth quarter of 2022, compared to 493,000 in 2019).
Stays abroad (4,161,000 in the fourth quarter of 2022), for their part, decreased by 10.4% compared to the same period in 2019 (4,644,000 trips), but experienced an increase of 27.6% compared to 2016 (3,262,000 trips). France (790,000 trips), the Netherlands (395,000) and Spain (367,000) remain the favourite destinations.
Belgians travel overwhelmingly during their holidays (3,903,000 trips, -7.6% compared to 2019). Only around 259,000 trips were made for work purposes in the fourth quarter of 2022.
Most often, stays are for one to three nights (2,392,000 trips).
