An extended travel window created by this year's Mid-Autumn and National Day holidays has sparked a sharp rise in long-distance domestic travel and outbound tourism.
With the two holidays falling just three days apart, many travelers seized the opportunity to extend their time off using flexible leave for a break of up to 13 days. This allows them to enjoy autumn scenery across distant regions, visit multiple destinations, or head abroad.
"This holiday, I'm going to take an in-depth trip. First, I'll go trekking in Yubeng for five days, then fly from Lijiang to Lhasa. Adding the two legs together -- two flights and a train -- getting from Lhasa back to Beijing cost only just over 2,000 yuan (about 298 U.S. dollars)," said a tourist surnamed Wang at Tianjin International Airport.
Another tourist named Ma chose Dali, Shangri-La and Lijiang in southwest China's Yunnan Province for his honeymoon.
"Since this year's holiday is relatively long, we thought we'd also use it as our honeymoon. We chose to first go to Dali and Shangri-La, and finally come back from Lijiang," he said.
Data from major travel platforms show that long-distance travel was the defining feature of the holiday.
"During the Mid-Autumn and National Day holidays, ticket bookings for domestic routes over 2,000 kilometers exceeded 2.57 million, a year-on-year increase of about 8 percent. The number of domestic passengers booking tickets to three or more destinations doubled year on year," said Ma Yezhi, an industry analyst at Umetrip. "During the National Day holiday period, ticket bookings for popular outbound destinations increased by more than 20 percent year on year. Thailand, South Korea, and Malaysia became the most popular countries. Chinese tourists flying to Venice, Stockholm and Geneva also doubled," said Shi Ke, a researcher at the Qunar Big Data Research Institute.
To meet the surge in demand, Chinese airlines have added international and domestic flights. Xiamen Airlines have scheduled 388 extra flights from Sept 30 to Oct 7, including 68 international services, and launched several new international routes to make it easier for travelers to reach farther and more diverse destinations.
The Mid-Autumn Festival, a traditional Chinese holiday, is celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth month of the Chinese lunar calendar. This year, the festival falls on Friday, and the public holiday lasts three days through Sunday.
China's National Day holiday, typically an annual seven-day public holiday from Oct 1 to Oct 7, is known as the Golden Week, during which large numbers of Chinese people travel across the country.
Mid-Autumn and National Day holiday window fuels surge in long-distance, outbound travel
