Cruise ship visitors boosted the total number of visitors to Bermuda in May, with an increase of 5.7 percent over May last year. Cruise ship arrivals of 30,234 -- the highest number of May cruise ship visitors since 1995 -- accounted for an increase of 16.16 percent compared with last year. Air arrivals slipped 0.68 percent to 42,568. For the year to date, arrivals have risen 2.68 percent to 174,907 compared to January to May, 1998. A 16 percent increase in the number of visitors from the Northeast region of the United States helped offset a decrease in air arrivals from almost every other region of the US compared to May last year. Overall, air arrivals from the US were up a quarter of one percent. There was encouraging news from the Canadian market as air arrivals rose for the first time this year, jumping nearly five percent. Arrivals from Europe continued to show strength, going up nearly 11 percent for the month. However, air arrivals from the UK fell for the third month this year by almost 22 percent compared to May 1998. There was an overall decrease of 0.66 percent for all countries for May and an overall decrease of 1.56 percent for the year to date. But length of stay and bednights, both key indicators of visitor spending, fell. Average length of stay decreased slightly for the month of May from 4.95 last year to 4.9 this year. The number of bednights declined by 7.75 percent compared to the same period last year and are down 5.91 percent for the year to date. PHOTO Photo of Arthur Bean Warm welcome: St. George's town crier E. Michael Jones greets passengers on board the cruise liner Norwegian Crown as it enters port yesterday morning.