Tourists Return to Baldwin Beaches in a Big Way

Taking a look at Baldwin County beaches, tourism officials can finally stop holding their breath. "It really makes us all believe that people are coming back." Mike Foster with Gulf Shores and Orange Beach Tourism says after a disastrous 2010 tourist season thanks to the BP oil spill, numbers are in for this spring and they are off the charts.
"This year we did 65 million dollars compared to 47 million last year. That's dramatic."

The beaches haven't been this packed in two years and whether tourist came last year or they stayed away there was never any doubt in their minds that they would be back.

"Because of the oil spill we ended up changing our plans," says David Horton vacationing with his family from Shreveport, Louisiana. "We had planned to come here and changed the plans and went to Cancun instead."

That's what a lot of people did, changed their plans, but not Mark Rhodes from Franklin, Tennessee. "In Franklin you always hear the war stories. When you get down here it was perfect. Nothing you would ever think it would be like."

Tourism officials had hoped this season would be only as good as the 2009 season. But what they've got is so much more. "We really could never have anticipated we were going to get this kind of traffic," says Foster.

Tourism numbers translate into big bucks for Baldwin County. Gross retail sales for spring 2011 finished at just under 168 million dollars.