The number of trips residents took abroad and the money they spent on overseas purchases were more last year than at any time since the first quarter of 1996.

The news came yesterday in the Quarterly Bulletin of Statistics for the fourth quarter of 1999 which included statistics for the year in total.

It stated: "Bermuda residents took a total of 37,997 trips during the fourth quarter, 1999, 3.1 percent or 1,137 more than in the fourth quarter, 1998.'' Meanwhile there was a five percent increase in the number of trips taken in 1999 (132,386) compared to the number taken in 1998 (126,031).

The primary reason for travel continued to be for holiday vacations and the major destination continued to be the United States. In 1999, 115,456 trips were made for vacations, 5,669 were local business trips, 6,763 international business trips and 4,498 trips for other reasons.

And during this year, 95,762 trips were made to the US, 16,055 to Canada, 11,366 to the UK and 9,203 to other countries.

The Bulletin noted that there was a significant increase seen in one area of quarterly travel in particular.

Residents took 2,785 trips to the UK during the fourth quarter of 1999 as opposed to the last three months of 1998 when they took 2,269, a jump of 516.

The Bulletin suggested that this "was a result of discounted airfares offered to selected European cities just prior to the Christmas holidays''.

Meanwhile resident purchases abroad during the fourth quarter of 1999 increased by 20.1 percent year-over-year. During this period, $11.8 million worth of goods were declared to Customs by residents returning to the Island.

This was almost $2 million more than the amount declared during the same period of the previous year.

Goods to the value of $34.4 million were declared throughout 1999, a 9.7 percent increase over 1998 when $31.2 million worth of goods were declared.

Purchases of clothing and footwear topped the list at $15.2 million for the year and was followed by miscellaneous purchases ($4.8 million); household items, furniture and appliances ($3.7 million); electronic and photographic equipment ($3.4 million); toys and sports goods ($2.4 million); tools, machinery and parts ($1.6 million); tapes, records and compact discs ($1.4 million); computer hardware and software ($1.3 million); and jewellery and watches ($590,000).