But the return of events to the regions is aiding economic recovery.

There was also a 48 per cent drop on overnight stays with 664,000 people spending the night in the region. This was better than the 53 per cent drop Victoria saw in overnight stays as a whole.

In total overnight visitors to the Bendigo region spent 2,022,000 nights. The number was a 28 per cent drop on the previous year but was still a much better result than the 44 per cent decrease seen across the whole of Victoria.

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City of Greater Bendigo tourism marketing manager Glenn Harvey said post lockdown periods had usually resulted in an influx of visitors.

"We noticed, particularly coming out of lockdown periods, there were visitors," he said. "A lot of visitation in late 2020 came after Melbourne's lockdown. There was an eagerness to explore regional places.

"What was encouraging was the summer period but we also had a lot who visited on a traditionally quieter period of the year.

"I remember looking website stats (after lockdowns) and we had double the amount of visitation on the website than we would normally get."

Mr Harvey said attracting people to the region in traditionally quiet times would be an important part of the city's economic recovery from the pandemic.

"Probably one of strategies we are focusing on is building (busy) periods where it hasn't traditionally been busy," he said. "Bendigo is at its peak in autumn and spring, which is looking promising again but we are targeting other times to get visitation and aid recovery.

"That's why we brought Awaken (to Bendigo). It has the ability to being people to Bendigo in the depths of winter and it encourages overnight stays because it's a night event."

In the first quarter of 2021, regional Victoria has seen a six per cent in overnight trips.

This was accompanied by a 23 per cent increase in visitor spending.

Mr Harvey said the increase during the first quarter of the year came thanks to events beginning to return.

"Now we are starting to see events coming back, more people coming back again," he said.

"We currently have Awaken and are in the final week of Mary Quant but coming up is Bendigo on the Hop and the Australian Sheep and Wool Show.

"It's positive signs on the road to recovery which is great. We are still recovering but it is looking positive."

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