The second quarter (April-June 2015) statistics for "Household Domestic Tourism" announced by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) show that 10,272,000 people living in Turkey went on vacation in April, May and June. The number of trips that people who spent one or more days away decreased 17 percent compared to the same quarter of the previous year, when it reached 13,033,000. The trips that were made to visit relatives topped the list with 65 percent. The trips made for "travel, entertainment, and vacation" purposes ranked second with 17 percent and trips for health reasons ranked third with 7.7 percent.
Turks, due to traditional tight family ties, are known for frequent visits to relatives. People who made trips in the second quarter of the year spent the night at the houses of their friends and relatives, thus accounting for most of the overnight stays, with 59,582,000 nights. According to accommodation types, 9,194,000 overnight stays were spent in the travelers' own houses while 6,335,000 overnight stays were in hotels.
People who took a trip in the second quarter of the year spent 80,132,000 nights away. The average overnight stays were 6.1 days long while the average amount of money spent by travelers was TL 336 ($117). Domestic tourism expenditure during their trips decreased 6.7 percent compared to the same quarter of the previous year, sliding to TL 4.3 million. Travel expenses were made personally or as tour packages. Around 91.6 percent of tourism expenses were personal expenditure while 8.4 percent (TL 376,304,000) was made through travel packages.
