by Donald Wood
Last updated: 10:57 AM ET, Fri February 23, 2018
After a series of terror attacks in France over the last two years, tourism to Paris is on the rise once again.
According to Reuters.com, international visitor numbers to Paris and the Ile de France region in 2017 climbed to 33.8 million total tourists, an increase of 9.9 percent in Paris and 9.5 percent in Ile de France.
International visitors from Japan, Germany, and the United States bolstered those numbers.
In 2016, tourism numbers dropped to 30.9 million from the 32.4 million visitors registered in 2015, and officials in France blamed the decline on a series of terror attacks, including the November 2015 murders of 130 people.
"The tourism industry has shown how resilient it is after the attacks, strikes and bad weather incidents that took a toll in 2015 and 2016," CRT tourism body president Eric Jeunemaitre told Reuters.
Some of the most visited destinations and sites in Paris last year include the Louvre museum with 8.1 million visits, the Chateau de Versailles with 7.7 million visits and the Eiffel Tower with 6.2 million visits.
Jeunemaitre also said the tourism board expects the upward trend to continue in 2018.
While international visitors arriving in Paris from many countries saw large spikes, tourists from the United Kingdom only rose 2.4 percent. Officials attribute the slow increase to a dip in spending power after Britain's decision to leave the European Union.
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