The charts below give information about travel to and from the UK,
and about the most popular countries for UL residents to visit.
The line chart shows the changes in the number of people who went to and came from the UK for travel during the period from 1979 to 1999. The bar chart shows where the British outbound tourists went most in 1999.
It is notable that the increase of the number of the UK outbound tourists was sharper than the overseas counterparts. The amounts of both kinds of the travellers were similar, at about 11 million, in 1979. In the next 6 years, the figure of two types of tourists saw a steady climb, whereas the British travellers were about 20 million in 1985, more than the foreigners (about 15 million). By comparison, the number of the UK outbound tourists increased by about 35 million, to approximate 55 million at the end of the 1990s, about twice as many as the foreigners.
We can see that considerable proportion of British tourists went to France and Spain in 1999, about 20% (11 million) and 13% (9 million), respectively. In contrast, the number of people went to the USA, Greece and Turkey were all less than 5 million.
The British outbound travellers outnumbered the foreign travellers who visited the UK during the whole period, and about one-third of them travelled to France and Spain in 1999.
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