Boom begins as schools set for summer holiday

With the school summer break around the corner, the tourism market is heating up.

Data as of June 23 from travel portal Qunar showed that flight bookings for the summer vacation represented a more than twofold week-on-week increase, with tours of coastal cities and frontier regions becoming hot keywords.

Trips to northwestern regions have gained in popularity, according to data from another online travel agency Ctrip. Bookings for Qinghai tours during the summer holiday surged by 313 percent year-on-year. Those for hotels in and flights to the Northwest China province rocketed by 394 and 537 percent year-on-year, respectively.

Tours to escape the summer heat are an industry worth trillions of yuan. It has a consumer base numbering hundreds of millions, comprised of the elderly, students, teachers and residents of sweltering cities, Dai Bin, president of China Tourism Academy, told Economic Information Daily.

"Especially for the tourism market during the summer vacation, escaping the heat, healthcare and study tours will become the three segments that support market growth, and they are also vital to the optimistic market forecast for the second half of this year," Dai said.

To lure more tourists and gain an edge in the increasingly fierce market, operators of scenic sites and tour companies have taken action to integrate local culture into their tourism products, presenting more diverse offerings.

At nightfall, two actors playing Fang Xuanling and Du Ruhui, two renowned officials from the Tang Dynasty (618-907), show up at Grand Tang Mall, a major tourist destination in Xi'an, Northwest China's Shaanxi province. The city served as the nation's capital during the Tang Dynasty.

Dressed in long gowns with loose sleeves, they interact with tourists, employing witty and playful inquiries. Those who provide the correct answers are rewarded with tokens of appreciation.

The scenes play out in an interactive show named Grand Tang Secret Box, which aims to popularize Chinese history and culture among audiences in a creative way.

"The combination of a knowledge quiz and a talk show makes for a wonderful fusion of history and fashion," said Zhang Qianqian, a tourist from North China's Shanxi province. The unique activity has propelled the Grand Tang Mall, a landmark 2,100-meter-long pedestrian zone in Xi'an, into internet stardom once again.

In Hangzhou, East China's Zhejiang province, which was the national capital during the latter half of the Song Dynasty (960-1279), a series of tourism events have been rolled out, including a Song-themed lifestyle festival.

During the three-day festival, 10 cultural travel routes were launched and 18 high-level lectures, intangible cultural heritage classes and cultural salons were offered. The festival attracted some 120,000 participants on-site or online, spurring direct consumption worth more than 2.7 million yuan ($377,050), said an official with the city's culture and tourism administration.

In Enshi Tujia and Miao autonomous prefecture, Central China's Hubei province, Shao Aihua, head of the Enshi cultural and tourism bureau, said his team works to introduce intangible cultural heritage from museums and cultural centers into daily life scenes. They integrate such heritage into regular performances and tourist experiences in scenic sites, such as wine songs and bamboo crafts.

China Daily - Xinhua