More than 200 foreign tourists visited Cicheng, a township in Ningbo's Jiangbei District on Tuesday. Deeply attracted by local crafts like red Chinese knot, embroidery, paper cutting, clay figurines, porcelain, and teapot, one of them even had a try on making traditional rice cakes.
It is understood that so far a modern tourist product system has been established, composed of such specialized products as sightseeing, leisure holiday, culture experiencing, recreation and health, conventions and exhibitions, shopping, food and festival celebrations. A series of new leisure industries, including mountaineering, hiking, cycling, skiing, sea fishing, yachting, camping, movies and TV dramas and island tourism, have come into existence and begun to flourish. Currently, there are over 130 tourist attractions, including one 5A scenic area and 25 4A scenic areas.
Statistics from Ningbo Municipal Tourism Bureau show that during the 11th Five-year Plan period, 195 tourist projects were under construction, with a total investment of 78.7 billion yuan. Among others, the high-star hotels, rural tourism, leisure and recreation and other new industries are the favorite targets for investment from private capitals, and attract joint investment from the state-owned capitals and foreign capitals. The major projects mainly locate in such areas as the area around the city, Dongqian Lake area, the coastal area in Xiangshan County, the Siming Mountain area and the area around Xiangshan Port.
According to statistics, at present 84 tourism projects are under construction in Ningbo with a total investment of up to 109.38 billion yuan or an average investment of 1.3 billion yuan for each project, both ranking as No. 1 among cities in Zhejiang Province.
The surge of travellers during the eight-day National Day holiday continues in Ningbo as fine weather extends to the fourth day of the holiday. Major tourist destinations in Ningbo received around 886,000 tourists, a year-on-year increase of 35.14 percent, according to statistics released yesterday by Municipal Holiday Office.
In the past few days, the major hotels in Ningbo's major tourist attractions such as the Simingshan National Forest Park, Cixi Dapeng Mountain, and the Dongqian Lake were fully booked up. Hotels in Yuyao also reported more than 90 per cent full.
The downtown hotels also see hot demand. Reservations of budget hotels rose sharply as a good selection of self-drive tourists. As many couples have chosen to hold their wedding ceremonies during the 8-day celebration, wedding banquet reservations in high-star hotels are now seeing increase. Statistics show that the city's high-star hotel reported an average booking rate of 68 percent yesterday
Ningbo tourism income, as shown in the released tourism economy report of the first three quarters, reached 58.72 billion Yuan, up by 12.8% over the same period of last year.
Despite the slowdown of the macro economy, Ningbo tourism industry grows. From January to September, Ningbo has received 41.75 million domestic tourists and 806,900 tourists from abroad with an increase of 7.82% on the previous year. Income from domestic tourism stands at 55.468 billion Yuan, up by 7.82% and foreign exchange income exceeds US$500 million.
After the summer tourism peak, tourism industry continues to grow. In July and August, all the scenery spots in Ningbo have received 7.82 million tourists, up by 7.14% over the same period of last year. Remarkably growth goes to the Haishu District with an increase of 254.35% and the Jiangdong District with an increase of 186.52%.
As new travel methods such as parent-children travel have contributed to tourism growth, festival celebrations have also played a great role. Tourism income of Cixi and Yuyao has increased by 73.77% and 27.04% thanks to their celebration activities in summer holiday. Xiangshan, among other scenery spots, ranks first in receiving tourists.
As the first day of the Golden week and the first day of the holiday for free passage of private cars, September 30 witnessed many citizens conduct self-driving tours. The traffic pressure around Ningbo was not very heavy and everything was in order in all the major scenic areas in Ningbo.
The number of tourists to such hot scenic areas as Xikou Scenic Spot, Fenghuang Mountain Amusement Park, Dapeng Mount Tourist Resort, Cicheng Ancient town, Dongqian Lake Tourist resort and Ningbo Ocean World saw a slight increase, with tourists mainly coming from the nearby areas in Jiangsu Province, Zhejiang Province and Shanghai in self-driving tours organized by family, friends or self-driving clubs. The number of tourists to the Old Bund and Baoguo Temple in Jiangbei District and Haitian Island almost doubled that of usual days.
