Just 41% of U.S. travelers said in a June 2022 sentiment survey that they had a trip to Canada planned in the following nine months. Granted this was before Canada announced an end to all entry requirements as of Oct. 1, but confidence in vacationing north of the border has taken a hit. Consider that before the COVID-19 pandemic, two-thirds of Canada’s total overnight visitors were from the U.S.
Marsha Walden, Destination Canada’s chief executive officer, says her No. 1 priority is communicating to Americans that Canada is wide open. “We've always been a very safe country to visit, but now all of those little hassle factors that used to make it a little harder to plan your trip are gone,” she says. “So it's very, very, easy now to enter Canada.”
The removal of all COVID-era restrictions — mandatory masking rules, the ArriveCAN entry app, vaccination cards, random airport testing and potential quarantines — comes as the North American holiday season approaches. It also comes more than two years since the pandemic decimated Canada’s tourism industry.
