Aussies head overseas in growing numbers

The number of Australians travelling overseas jumped 10 percent in the past year, with official figures showing outbound trips booming as the local currency soars. Australian Bureau of Statistics figures recorded Australians went on 7.44 million short-term overseas visits over the 2010-11 fiscal year as the Aussie dollar hit historic highs -- an increase of 9.9 percent on 2009-10. Chief of industry body Tourism and Transport Forum, John Lee, said Friday Australians were happy to take advantage of the strong currency, which has soared around 30 percent over the past year and is well above the greenback. Lee said Australian travellers were heading to resorts and beaches, with the number of journeys to Indonesia jumping by 153,000 over the year, and to the United States rising by 116,000. "A lot of it is what we would say is about cultural tourism, it's about pleasure tourism," he told AFP. "It's people enjoying Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia." The Aussie dollar has been strengthening against the greenback since last year on the back of Australia's mining boom, and hit its highest level against the US currency since its 1983 float of 110.62 US cents in late July. In terms of inbound tourism, arrivals from Asia were also higher with those from China up 26.8 percent over the 2010-11 financial year, Lee said. Growth in arrivals from Malaysia was 13.7 percent, while visits from Indonesia were up 12.4 percent and India 11.3 percent higher. Meanwhile, arrivals from those regions under debt pressure were lower, with visits from the United States down 4.7 percent, while those from Britain dropped 3.1 percent and Ireland was down 10.2 percent.