Seattle-area residents’ vacations have changed; here’s how

Memorial Day is here, and the holiday marks the start of the summer travel season. I thought I’d take the opportunity to explore some new data that shows travel among Seattle-area vacationers has not just rebounded from the pandemic — it’s now at an all-time high.

According to surveys conducted from January 2023 to February 2024 by market-research giant Nielsen, 3.8 million adults in the Seattle market area — that’s 85% of the nearly 4.5 million adult population — have taken at least one overnight-or-longer trip in the past 12 months.

That handily beats the numbers from the period before the pandemic took hold. In surveys taken from February 2018 to February 2019, 3.4 million adults in the Seattle market had taken an overnight-or-longer trip in the past 12 months, representing 80% of the adult population.

For the most recent data release, Nielsen surveyed around 4,000 adults in the Seattle market, which includes most of the Puget Sound area. The 2019 release surveyed nearly 4,400 adults.

The data doesn’t just show an increase in travel activity from the prepandemic period. It also shows significant changes in where we like to vacation. Some destinations have increased tremendously in popularity among Seattle-area vacationers, while others have lost some of their appeal.

Let’s take a look at the destinations that had the sharpest increase in visitors.

Palm Springs, Calif., is hot, and I don’t just mean the temperature. This desert resort town, about 100 miles east of Los Angeles, has surged in popularity in recent years. It also saw the biggest increase in visitors from the Seattle area of any overnight destination.

The latest Nielsen data shows a projected 208,000 Seattle-area adults visited Palm Springs in the past 12 months. That represents a remarkable 72% increase from the 2018-2019 period, when it only received about 87,000 visitors from our region.

It seems Seattle-area vacationers are craving sunshine more than ever, because four of the five destinations with the fastest growth in visitors are hot, sunny locales. Mexico ranked No. 2, up 43% from the 2018-2019 period, followed by Phoenix, which was up 30% and Hawaii, up 27%.

In contrast, the destination that rounded out the Top 5 is best known for cold-weather activities, especially around the Christmas season. It’s also a lot closer to home, making it an ideal weekend getaway. Overnight-or-longer visitors from the Seattle area to Leavenworth, the Bavarian-style mountain town in Chelan County, increased by about 21%, hitting around 750,000.

Despite the overall increase in travel among Seattle-area residents, some destinations have fallen in popularity since the prepandemic period. The place that experienced the sharpest decline may not be a surprise.

San Francisco has gotten a lot of bad press in the past few years. The rise of remote work has emptied out its downtown, leading to a string of store closures. Reports of rampant car break-ins, open-air drug use and other issues have contributed to negative perceptions of the city, fair or not.

It’s put a dent in tourism, including from the Seattle area, where the number of visitors dropped by about 21%, the sharpest decline of any overnight destination. A projected 303,000 adults from this area visited San Francisco in the past 12 months, according to the most recent Nielsen data. That’s down by more than 80,000 from the prepandemic period.

Canada has also lost popularity among Seattle-area vacationers. Two of the five destinations with the greatest losses of visitors from this area were in British Columbia. Victoria ranked second, down 19%, and Vancouver was fourth, down 9%.

But keep in mind international travel came to a standstill in 2020 as pandemic lockdowns took hold. Nielsen data shows the number of Seattle-area visitors to British Columbia is increasing quickly, but it may take some more time to fully rebound.

Chicago may be suffering from a similar decline in reputation as San Francisco, with some data showing fear of crime has affected tourism to downtown Chicago, although some evidence shows it seems to be on the upswing. The Windy City had the third-sharpest decline in visitors from the Seattle area, a drop of 9.5%. Alaska rounded out the Top 5, down 6%.

In case you’re wondering about Portland, it saw the sixth-fastest drop in overnight-or-longer visitors from around here, down 5%. In the 2018-2019 data, Portland was the top destination for Seattle-area travelers, with a projected 944,000 adults staying overnight or longer. In the latest data, the Rose City fell to No. 2, with 49,000 fewer visitors.

And the new top destination for Seattle-area visitors? The Washington coast ranked No. 1 in the latest Nielsen data, attracting a little over 1 million vacationers from the Seattle area. That represents an increase of about 169,000, or 19%.