Badaling section of the Great Wall in Beijing.

While American's travel to perennial favorites like Los Angeles, Orlando, New York and Las Vegas is always strong, some unexpected destinations -- from Colorado and Arizona to Croatia and China -- are showing up as hot spots for travel as the 2006 season begins.

China is No. 6 on the US State Department's list of top international destinations for travel by U.S. residents, with 1.8 million Americans visiting China in 2004. Those numbers include visits both to the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong, and represent a 72 percent increase over 2003, when travel to the region was dampened by fear of SARS.

Pauline Frommer, of the Frommer guidebooks, said that the message boards at Frommers.com have 10 times more postings from China than any other Asian country. "You hear more and more about people going to China and not just to Beijing, but also to Shanghai," Frommer said. "It's a place Americans should see. They're shaping up to be our big competitors."

"Americans want to see it before it gets to be the dominating Westernized country," Whitley added. "You look at Shanghai -- they want it to be like Paris. There's so much being said about the Chinese culture, and the influence it's going to have on the world. It's very much of interest to Americans."

In addition to Shanghai, Whitley says tourists are visiting historic sites like the Great Wall, the famed terra cotta warriors near Xian and the historic Silk Road route.

Whitley added that concerns about avian flu have not yet dampened interest in the region. "It's too unknown," he said of the disease, citing the lack of official travel warnings from the World Health Organization and other agencies.

(Agencies)

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