This year’s holiday began with the Mid-
Typically hundreds of millions of Chinese travel at home and overseas during such holidays. The eight-day-long holiday is the longest week of public holidays since COVID-19 pandemic restrictions were lifted in December. Outbound tourism has lagged domestic travel, with flight capacities lagging behind pre-pandemic levels.
Big cities like the capital,
All that travel is a boon for the world's No. 2 economy: During the week-long May holiday this year, 274 million tourists spent
“Over the last few years with the pandemic, there's been really strong pent-up demand,” said
In
Another 21 million passengers are expected to travel by air during the holiday, with an average of about 17,000 flights per day, according to the
Jia Jianqiang, CEO of
“Many people are now also inclined towards more customized, high-end tours compared to the large group tours that were popular (before the pandemic),” Jia said.
For many Chinese, long public holidays such as
“Most Chinese don’t have long holidays, so this time of the year is when everyone can take the longest break and the only time to travel for fun,” said Fu Zhengshuai, an IT engineer and photography enthusiast who often travels alone to remote areas in
The downside of traveling during such big holidays is that everyone else is out there, too, and prices of tickets to attractions, food, and accommodations are high, Fu said.
For student Ma Yongle, traveling during big holidays means long waiting times, huge crowds, and heavy traffic. Train tickets often are sold out.
“I saw more people than scenery. I spent longer time waiting than eating. Train tickets were sold out quickly and traffic was heavy,"Ma said. "More time was wasted and little was left for enjoying the scenery, which spoiled my mood.”
She has since adopted what is referred in
A growing but still relatively small number of Chinese are venturing abroad. According to
Overseas travel is bound to bounce back, Chai said.
“If you look at flight capacity, it has only recovered to about half of pre-pandemic levels,” he said. “As flight capacity starts to pick up toward the end of this year and next year, outbound travel will continue to increase.”
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