TORONTO, Jan. 17 (UPI) -- A cold snap has stepped up the annual migration of Canadians flocking to tourist spots in tropical climates, the Toronto Sun reported.
As Canada and and Northeast in the Untied States shuddered with cold, Canadian snow birds escaped to the warm and inexpensive destinations of Mexico, Cuba and the Dominican Republic.
"People have suffered with this cold the last week or so and decided it's time to get away," said John Stafford of Stafford Travel, in Toronto.
One Puerto Vallarta hotel in Mexico, Club Miraval, said 60 percent to 70 percent of its guests are Canadian.
"We always go to Mexico in January," Susan Massey, a telecommunications worker from Toronto, vacationing in Mexico with her family, told the Sun.
Despite the cold snap -- where the temperature high was in single digits and the windchill made it feel like minus 25 degrees Fahrenheit -- no records were set in Toronto.
"Records are very hard to break. It has to be an extreme," said meteorologist Alain Boisvert "As far as temperature, we've seen colder."
