NATCHEZ — The numbers are mixed; fewer bus tours are making their way to Pilgrimage this year, but sales of individual tickets are up.

“Individual ticket sales have been running about 5 to 10 percent ahead of last year, and that is always good, but especially when gas prices have gone higher again and the economy isn’t really recovered,” Natchez Pilgrimage Tours Executive Director Marsha Colson said.

The area is seeing fewer bus tours, however, because many bus tour companies aren’t able to book enough clients to make the bus tour viable, Colson said.

“If they don’t sign up whatever their break even number is, we have had a lot cancel on that account, and that is unfortunate,” she said.

Individual tours may be up even though bus tours are down because the people who do individual tours are a different demographic than those who do bus tours, Colson said.

“People who get in a car and drive somewhere on their own, they are often people who live in some cold place and they are going to their warm weather home to get away from the cold, or they are driving across country and making a stop here,” she said.

One factor Colson said she has identified in increasing individual tours is the fact that more people are going to visit New Orleans. Local tourism took a hit after Hurricane Katrina left much of the Big Easy devastated, she said.

“We learned after Katrina that Natchez tourism is dependent on New Orleans — people who are on their way down there were stopping here as well,” she said.

“New Orleans business is starting to come back, and we are probably enjoying the benefit of that as well.”

Kate Don Green, whose house, Oakland, is on tour, said she has seen people from both out of state and out of country, but the numbers at her house compare to those of last year.

“It usually picks up in the third or fourth week, so we are expecting it to pick up soon,” she said.

Colson said that ultimately what is driving the individual numbers up — and the bus numbers down —is a bit of a mystery.

“There are things out there affecting our tourism business that I can’t identify or evaluate,” she said. “If I knew what they were, I would be doing everything I can to take advantage of what that factor is, or if it was when business was down I would be doing what I could to counteract that factor.”

Pilgrimage began March 10. It will last until April 14.

Tickets can be purchased from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Natchez Visitor Reception Center.

For more information, visit www.natchezpilgrimage.com.