Saint Lucia, the renowned and beautiful Eastern Caribbean tourist gem, kicks off its 2010 Summer/Fall Travel Road Shows on Monday, August 2, starting in Eatontown, New Jersey on the northeastern seaboard of the United States.

Promoting the island under the theme “Live the Legend,” which highlights the uniqueness and authenticity of the destination’s products, services and attractions to the travel agent community, the Saint Lucia Tourist Board’s (SLTB) marketing and sales teams head for Eatontown, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington DC/ Virginia from Monday, August 2 to Thursday, August 5 this week.

Nerdin St. Rose, SLTB’s Vice President of Marketing and Sales, said her team will tour about 20 cities in August, September and early October, before turning over the sales effort to the Canadian office in mid-October.

“We won’t rest on our laurels,” said St. Rose before leaving the island for the Mid-Atlantic area to join Saint Lucia’s sales associates. “The phenomenal growth we are currently experiencing is very much due in part to the hard work of our sales teams and the travel agent community in our source markets, and we plan to strengthen these relationships over the next few months,” she said.

St. Rose reported that other stops along the itinerary include: Charlotte, North Carolina; Atlanta, Georgia; Miami and Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Houston and Dallas Texas; Waukesha, Wisconsin; Oak Brook, Illinois; Mason, Ohio; Warren, Michigan; Burlington, Massachusetts; Farmington, Connecticut; White Plains, Woodbury and New York City, New York.

Year to date, Saint Lucia has recorded an overall 11.9 percent increase in stay-over visitors for the six-month period January through June 2010 as passenger arrivals increased from 145,575 in 2009 to 162,856 this year.

The most impressive growth came from the United States market, which accounted for 42% of all arrivals and registered an average 31.3% growth rate over 2009 figures. Total US arrivals reached 68,776 by the end of June 2010.

For more information about the island of Saint Lucia, visit StLuciaNow.com or call a travel professional.