First State tourism officials have a bright outlook for this summer.
"There's a strong, pent up demand for travel. I think you're going to see the summer season extremely strong," said Kent County Tourism Corporation President Pete Bradley.
Bradley has a positive outlook for his county about summer tourism saying people are ready to travel again after the COVID pandemic.
Of course tourism in Delaware didn’t take a big hit from the pandemic. Delaware Tourism earlier this month reported record tourism numbers in 2021 with almost 10 million overnight visitors to the state.
And Delaware Tourism Office Director Jessica Welch says all reports so far indicate this summer could be a big one.
"We are hearing from hotels and restaurants and other places that rentals are booked up, hotels are booked up, people need to book like a year out in order to get into these places. The state parks, all of their lodging is pretty much booked up,” said Welch. “So we are expecting a pretty big summer travel season in Delaware."
Welch adds this summer could be bigger than last year.
And AAA Mid-Atlantic’s Jana Tidwell says they’re also seeing lots of bookings for the summer.
"This is likely to be a very busy summer travel season. People are ready to travel there is still that pent up demand to travel, and people are showing us by the bookings into AAA Travel that they're ready," said Tidwell.
