More and more travelers are coming to the Caribbean from source markets beyond traditional travel hubs like New York, Miami and Chicago. If you’ve been following aviation in the region the last few years, you’ve seen a wave of new routes from cities like Austin, Raleigh, Minneapolis and even Los Angeles, which now has first nonstop Caribbean route with Cayman Airways. 

That includes Denver, Colorado, which is getting another new Caribbean route this fall. 

On Oct. 29, United Airlines is adding a new daily nonstop route between Denver and San Juan, Puerto Rico, another new route for a destination that has been one of the hottest in the Caribbean in the last few years. 

It’s the first-ever flight between Denver and San Juan on any airline, representing nearly 50,000 new seats for the island. 

The flight connects San Juan with “one of the main cities in the western zone of the Continental United States,” said Carlos Mercado Santiago, executive director of the Puerto Rico Tourism Company. 

It’s a “unique opportunity to raise the profile of Puerto Rico as a vacation and business destination, encouraging even more visitors to travel to the Island throughout the year,” he said. 

Denver is one of the fastest-growing cities in the United States; while lately new routes have centered on Belize and Grand Cayman, it’s clearly an important new market for the region.