OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says Canadian residents took 1.2 million overnight car trips to the United States in December, up 8.7 per cent from November and the highest monthly figure in more than 20 years.

The auto travel contributed to a 5.8 per cent increase in all overnight travel in December as Canadian residents made two million overnight trips to the United States, the highest monthly figure since record keeping began in 1972.

While overnight car travel to the United States increased by 100,000 trips, same-day car travel decreased by the same amount to 2.6 million trips, down 3.7 per cent from November.

In the opposite direction, travel to Canada from the United States decreased 0.2 per cent in December despite a 1.3 per cent increase in overnight travel.

Overnight travel rose primarily because of a 2.7 per cent increase in overnight air travel, as U.S. residents took 318,000 trips to Canada in December.

At the same time, same-day car travel declined 2.5 per cent from November as American residents took 579,000 same-day car trips in December, the lowest monthly figure recorded since July 2009.