ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. -- Tourism experts are cautiously optimistic heading into the 2011-2012 travel season.
From January through May, visitation was up six percent over the same time period in 2010.
According to the St. Johns County Visitors and Convention Bureau (VCB), the area saw an increase in visitors last year as well, with 3.4 million visitors spending at least one night in the county during 2010-2011.
On average, those people stayed 5 days. They spent $634 million, including $38 million in sales tax and $5.6 million in bed taxes, according to the VCB.
Those hotel and motel bed taxes are used to pay for the bureau and their marketing campaigns, which are designed to bring more people to the area.
According to the VCB, they are trying new advertising this summer to try to keep people coming back.