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I wasn't sure if a separate tourism thread exists, so I thought I'd present the information. Houstonia posted an interesting article on tourism numbers from 2017 to 2018. The original article can be found here: https://www.houstoniamag.com/articles/2019/5/3/houston-had-23-million-visitors-in-2018 Here's some interesting numbers: The number of booked meetings and conventions rose from 429 in 2017 to 498 in 2018. About 19 million of our visitors in 2018 reside in the U.S., a 10 percent increase from what was reported for 2017. Of those 19 million, about 75 percent stayed overnight and 25 percent came for day trips. Roughly 72 percent of domestic visitors came to Houston for leisure activities, 18 percent came on business, and 10 percent came for other reasons. Millennials continue to comprise most of Houston’s domestic visitors, a trend reported in both 2017 and 2018 by an Omnibus study conducted by Omnitrak. Meanwhile, the 3.28 million international visits to Houston in 2018 is actually a 6.3 percent decrease from 2017—likely due to foreign policies and a strong dollar—and it’s expected to decline again in 2019. One truly big draw for Houston was Comicpalooza, which brought in a record 50,778 attendees from 47 states and 18 countries in 2018 with an economic impact of more than $20 million. Since I'm not native to Houston, I'm curious to hear people's thoughts on these numbers.

Recently I went to San Antonio for the weekend and had a change to go to SeaWorld. I couldn't help but think and have always wondered "Shouldn't SeaWorld at least be by the SEA !!!" The one in SanDiego is and the one in Central Florida is surrounded by lakes and really not that far from either coast. To have a sea-life based theme park in the middle of dusty and hilly south texas hmmm..... I don't see the connection. Now if SeaWorld was in the Houston-Galveston Area that would make sense. First, there's 3 or 4 times more people in H-town, close by the water (Galveston), alot of the state marine research in done here. Not trying to put down the Alamo City but come on, having SeaWorld there is kinda weird. I think the Houston Area should at least make a pitch to the owners of SeaWorld of Texas to see if there willing to relocate from San Antonio to Houston. Maybe I'm wrong about this, just saying.