St. Lucia Tourism Has September Slump

September was not kind to St. Lucia, as tourist stopover arrivals (persons staying 24 hours or more) fell 11 percent last month.

Cruise arrivals declined 51 percent, to 9,323 passengers, because of three fewer cruise calls than during September 2007, according to the St. Lucia Tourist Board. U.S. arrivals fell 21 percent, primarily due to American Eagle’s cutback to one flight a day from San Juan, down from three a day in September 2007.

Although U.S. could still fly to St. Lucia from the Atlanta and Miami gateways, a significant number were unable to get to St. Lucia because of reduced capacity, the tourist board said.

However, for the first nine months of 2008, stopover traffic increased 5.9 percent to 230,789 visitors, and cruise traffic jumped 5.1 percent, with eight more calls from January through September compared with the same period last year.