Soccer success boosts Croatia tourism

Croatia has gained much attention from Chinese tourists, with bookings of flights and hotels both surging after it made it to the World Cup final, with its popularity likely to last until the National Day holiday, according to an industry expert.

The price of flight tickets from China to Croatia has doubled since Croatia took part in the final game of the World Cup, according to Qunar, a firm that was acquired by Ctrip, the largest online travel agency in China.

This week, searches for a roundtrip flight in August between Beijing and Zagreb, capital of Croatia, carried a price tag of around 9,500 yuan ($1,420), twice the price last week. In the past week, the number of searches of hotels in Croatia soared nearly 300 percent over the past month, Ctrip said.