France has just released its official tourism figures for 2013. Did it retain its most visited country status once again? Here we run down the top ten most visited countries in 2013 according to the official figures published by the World Tourism Organisation.
The World’s Top 10 Most Visited Countries
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The world is getting smaller. It took
Columbus 2 months and 9 days to get to the Bahamas and he never actually
made it to what we now know as America. Eventually people managed to
complete the crossing, but the journey was arduous and long. Sailing
ships would have taken around 30-40 days, and although steam engines
greatly improved the speed and reliability of these trips (at around a
week of travel), it was still an enormous undertaking to cross from the
east coast of America to Europe. Journeys that went further and made use
of steamers, trains, and other modes of transports could have taken
months and months and would have been far outside the budget of most
people.
In 1923, Charles Lindbergh made the first solo transatlantic flight
on his plane, The Spirit of Saint Louis, just four years after the first
flight from Newfoundland to the UK. Since then planes have utterly
revolutionised transport in terms of speed, safety, and reliability.
Increasing leisure time and disposable income opened up tourism to the
masses, and in 2012 the number of international tourists topped 1bn for
the first time ever. So where does all this easy travel take us? Below
is a list of the most visited countries, according the World Tourism Organisation, and although many of the destinations are on everyone’s bucket list you might also find a few surprises in the mix.
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