BEIJING, Jan. 3 (Xinhua) -- Stepping off the plane, Shanghai native Shi Lei and her boyfriend embarked on an amazing journey in Shenyang, capital of northeast China's Liaoning Province, where temperatures plummeted to a bone-chilling minus 20 degrees Celsius.
This winter, tens of thousands of tourists, like Shi Lei, coming from afar, converged upon northeastern cities of China including Shenyang, Dalian, Changchun, and Harbin. These cold places have become a hit for winter tourism.
China's northeasternmost province, Heilongjiang, has received 10.09 million tourists via railway since November 2023, up 372 percent year on year, according to the China Railway Harbin Group Co., Ltd. The province's capital city, Harbin, and the country's northernmost cities, Mohe and Yichun, stand out as top destinations for ice and snow tourism.
The surge of tourists creates a booming homestay industry. According to Tujia, a major vacation rental website in China, Harbin has, for the first time, topped the list of the most sought-after homestay destination in China. During the New Year's holiday, Harbin witnessed a 27-fold increase in homestay bookings, while Shenyang experienced a 20-fold rise. Other areas in northeast China, such as Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, Changchun, Mudanjiang also registered remarkable growth.
Thanks to the promotion efforts of cultural and tourism officials of these areas, who held promotional events in cities like Beijing, Chongqing and Chengdu, the region's cultural heritage, tourism assets, and hospitality have been known across the country and on the Internet.
These places started to show its popularity since Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays of 2023, when Shenyang hosted a staggering 12.2 million domestic and international visitors and Jilin Province welcomed 25.4 million domestic tourists during the same period, up 113.56 percent year on year.
Developing tourism is only part of efforts of northeast China to tread a path of high-quality development and sustainable growth. In recent years, the region has undergone a transformational development, entering a new era of comprehensive revitalization.
In the first three quarters of 2023, Jilin's GDP growth stood at 5.8 percent, surpassing the national average by 0.6 percentage points. During the same period, Liaoning's economic growth outstripped the national average for the first time in the recent decade.
"Since 2023, the region's key economic indicators have consistently outperformed the national average, an inspiring result out of its overall efforts," said Li Kai, professor at China's Northeastern University, adding that the growing economic and social vitality will further boost its revitalization.
(Contributed by Sun Renbin, Ding Feibai and Wang Ying, edited by Li Shimeng and Zhao Yonggang, lishimeng@xinhua.org)
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