Above: Andicuri Beach in Aruba

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Aruba received 489,871 tourist stopover arrivals in the first six months of 2014, according to new data from the Caribbean Tourism Organization.

That represented a 5.3 percent improvement over the first half of 2013, according to the CTO.

The number was buoyed by a particularly strong summer period, which has already shown a 7.4 percent improvement over the summer of 2013.

Aruba’s growth was among the highest of Caribbean countries with complete reporting for the period, according to an analysis by Caribbean Journal.

Last year, Aruba received 979,256 tourist arrivals, an 8.3 percent increase over the previous year.