After months of closures, the attractions industry in China is now showing signs of life, as more than 23 million domestic tourist trips were made in the country on Friday 1 May.
According to China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism, over 23 million domestic tourist trips were made last Friday, which marked the start of the country’s five-day May Day holiday. This is the highest number of domestic tourism trips recorded since the COVID-19 crisis began at the end of 2019.
Beijing
CNTG reports that, by 2 pm on Friday, tourist attractions in Beijing had seen 720,000 tourists. While this is over 50% less than the same holiday period in 2019, it may well mark the fact that the country has turned a corner in the battle against coronavirus.
One of the city’s most popular attractions, the Palace Museum, partially reopened on 1 May, and tickets for the holiday were fully booked. However, the attraction is only welcoming 5,000 visitors at this time, after introducing a cap on its capacity of 80,000 in order to maintain safe social distancing.
The Beijing state-owned cultural assets administration centre also began handing out eVouchers over the holiday weekend, in order to kick-start the cultural sector. The number of vouchers issued equates to around 7 million US dollars. These can be used to buy tickets to art performances and sports competitions, as well as books and other leisure and entertainment services.
Shanghai
Shanghai also saw domestic tourists enjoying some of its key attractions over the May Day holiday, such as the Bund and the YuYuan Garden. Again, the figures were down on the previous year but show a positive upturn from the last few months.
Visitors can benefit from the new Visit Shanghai app, which provides up to date information on what is going on in the city, from cultural and sports events to food and shopping. It uses 5G to show information about the city in AR and AR.
Meanwhile, the province of Hubei was the worst-hit area of the country, and this is now showing signs of recovery too. 22 key attractions are now open again, including the Yellow Crane Tower in Wuhan.
Elsewhere, restrictions are beginning to lift in some European countries too. As Germany relaxes its lockdown, museums in Berlin have been told they can reopen on 4 May, with extra precautions in place. And after a successful trial, Kolmården Zoo is now extending its opening times.
