The Turkish travel industry has been enjoying some golden times recently, times, which in the light of lower tourist numbers in many other established regions, are even more impressive.

Turkish travel authorities have announced a 2 per cent increased in visitor numbers over the first three quarters of 2009, which represents about 24 million tourists. Within that 24 million figure are a lot of British people. In fact the number of Brits travelling to Turkey during 2009 has gone up by over 9 per cent over last year. Airlines like FlyThomascook.com have been working hard to satisfy the demand for flights to Turkey and are now the number one flight provider to Turkey from the UK.

Even though Turkey is in deep in the process of improving and expanding its holiday offerings, of course not all the visitor increases are down to Turkey itself. The region has received a huge helping hand from the currency markets, something which can account for much of the renewed British interest in Turkey. Not having the Euro as its currency means that the cost of holidays in Turkey has not jumped up like those in Euro-zone countries, and that immunity from price rises has made Turkey a very attractive proposition.

Turkey cannot remain complacent though and plans to use these good times to cement its place in the holiday makers minds. After all, flights to Spain are much shorter, its easier to arrange villas bookings directly with their owners, as many speak English and things like public transport are far more advanced. But Turkey realises the challenges of the task ahead and is already making significant investments to make sure those high visitor numbers do not disappear again as soon as, or if, currency markets shift back to previous levels.