Snow festival in Harbin woos tourists

For the 35th time, Harbin showed why it's one of the world's wintry capitals, opening the International Ice and Snow Festival on Saturday.

The signature event of Heilongjiang's provincial capital, which began as the Ice Lantern Show in 1985, has become one of the world's four largest ice and snow festivals - the other three are Japan's Sapporo Snow Festival, Canada's Quebec Winter Carnival and Norway's Holmenkollen Ski Festival.

The Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival, which attracts millions of tourists from around the world, continues through the end of February, overlapping with some of China's most important traditional holidays, such as Spring Festival and Lantern Festival.