Orlando and New York will top the list of Christmas long-haul destinations for UK families despite the slump in the value of the pound, according to research by an online marketing company.

The findings of US-based travel marketing and branding firm Sojern put the two US destinations ahead of Dubai, Bangkok and Sydney for December searches in the UK with a party size of three or more.

Sojern’s latest Global Travel Insights Report reveals that Orlando does not appear in the top five of three other origin markets surveyed,  including France, Germany and the Netherlands, although New York scored top with the French and third among Germans. France’s second choice, Bangkok, was number one with Germans and Dutch.

The French and Germans showed a propensity to holiday in a destination with former colonial or historical links. France’s third, fourth and fifth preferences, for example, were Reunion, Guadeloupe and Martinique, while the Dutch favoured Indonesia, South Africa and the Caribbean island of Curacao. Sojern found that French travellers especially have a strong allegiance to current or former territories, with 6 of the top 10 destinations searched being among these, including Montreal, Dakar and The Seychelles.

While Sojern says Bangkok globally has remained consistently popular since last year despite sporadic anti-government rioting, other troubled countries have fallen from grace. Turkey, for example, has fallen from 8th to 17th place because of its political instability and terrorist attacks, while Brazil’s popularity has faded with the Olympics, falling from overall third favourite among European families in 2015 to sixth in the list of preferences for 2017.