THERE were officially no vacancies in York at the weekend as predictions of a bumper Easter break came true for the city.

Central streets were packed, shops did a roaring trade, visitors queued to get into attractions and there were not enough rooms to go round for people hoping to stay the night.

North Yorkshire's tourist routes were jammed with trippers and Bank Holiday weekend events attracted visitors in their thousands across the county.

The weekend's success bears out the predictions of internet service providers who identified York as one of the favourite places being researched by online surfers checking out potential Easter breaks.

The throngs were welcome good news for the region's tourism industry, fuelling hopes for a bumper season after several years of relative gloom over events including flooding, foot and mouth disease and the threat of international terrorism.

Even the newly-introduced parking charges failed to put off tourists coming to see the city's attractions.

The controversial parking charges were brought in at the end of March and resulted in drivers having to pay to park in previously free 60-minute bays.

Charges were also introduced in the city's car parks between 6pm and 9pm.

Gill Cook, from York Tourist Information Centre, said it had been an extremely busy weekend on all fronts.

She said: "It started quiet in the early part of last week, but then it was busy on Friday and throughout.

"A lot of people came in on Saturday trying to book accommodation on the day. We managed to find it for almost everybody, but not all.

"There have been lots of day trippers with a good mixture of people staying for a couple of days and people coming for the day.

"There have been a lot of people from places about two hours away such as West Yorkshire, along with overseas visitors on holiday."

York Dungeon said it had seen queues on Saturday and yesterday.

Linda Davis, operations manager, said: "We have been very busy. We have had queues of about an hour over the weekend.

"I think we have had as good an Easter as we did last year. There have been a lot of day trippers as well as people coming to stay."

James Pegg, duty manager at the National Railway Museum, thought figures were up from last year, with about 15,000 people visiting over the weekend.

Helmsley Castle, which recently opened a new visitors' centre, also enjoyed a busy weekend.

There were also major crowds at Selby's annual Game Fair, and tourists were drawn to Castle Howard for its Easter events.

Updated: 10:02 Monday, April 12, 2004