BEIJING: Rising jet fuel costs and uncertainty over international air routes are driving a shift from outbound to domestic travel, with Chinese tourism platforms predicting that this year’s Labor Day holiday is expected to see a surge in domestic tourism.
The Labor Day public holiday in China this year is a five-day break from May 1 to 5.
Data from online travel agency Qunar showed that bookings for long-haul trips to domestic destinations over 800 kilometers away have increased more than 30 percent year-on-year, while hotel reservations in popular third-tier and smaller cities have doubled.
According to a report by the online travel platform Tuniu, bookings for domestic package tours during the Labor Day holiday increased 10 percent year-on-year, with self-drive tour bookings surging over 50 percent and free independent travel bookings rising nearly 20 percent.
As overseas travel becomes less predictable, many Chinese tourists are opting for more relaxed, immersive domestic experiences. Among emerging trends is “lie-flat travel” — low-key, quality stays in smaller cities, often in star hotels that cost a fraction of those in first-tier cities.
For example, an office worker surnamed Qi from Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province, chose Jiayu, a small county in Hubei, about an hour’s drive from her home. “Deciding to travel to my doorstep made me feel relaxed,” she said.
“I booked a very nice hotel for only a third of the price in a first-tier city, saving me 1,000 yuan ($146).”
Another traveler, Lyu Qing, a Beijing resident who used to take her child abroad every holiday, opted this time for Luzhou, a lesser-known city in Sichuan province. “Flights to Europe are too expensive without stopovers in the Middle East, and routes to Southeast Asia are uncertain,” she said. “So I chose a small domestic city — fewer crowds, cheaper and more reliable.”
Qunar data showed that hotel bookings in destinations such as Ding’an in Hainan province surged 8.7 times year-on-year, while Luzhou in Sichuan saw a fivefold increase and Zhongshan in Guangdong province a fourfold rise. The average price of luxury hotels in popular small cities is more than 40 percent lower than in first-tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, with some county-level luxury hotels charging as little as 300 yuan per night during the holiday peak period.
The introduction of a spring break from late April to early May in about 30 cities — including Hangzhou and Ningbo in Zhejiang province, Changsha in Hunan province and Shenyang in Liaoning province — has encouraged families to travel earlier, thereby easing congestion during the traditional peak period. Qunar said that staggered spring breaks across regions have effectively extended the holiday period to 17 days, from April 24 to May 10.
Tuniu said that the travel boom in Zhejiang is expected to start early, from Tuesday, driven by the spring break. The combined spring break and Labor Day holiday has created an extended “3+5” vacation, with local bookings surging by 135 percent year-on-year for the period. –The Daily Mail-China Daily news exchange item
