I fled the bright lights of Beijing before the start of the Golden Week break in May and headed to the coast to relax and unwind.
I chose to go to Weihai, a small and quiet town in Shandong featuring a long coastline and unspoilt beaches. Part of Weihai's shoreline is known as "the end of the sky," because it lies on one of the easternmost edges of the Chinese mainland.
Although the journey was stressful - it involved a 10-hour drive and several grinding traffic jams - I was glad to escape the huge crowds that were sure to form in the Chinese capital during each Golden Week.
However, even I was shocked when I watched the news on TV of the trampling tourist herd in town.
On the second day of the weeklong national holiday, some 114,800 visitors swarmed the Forbidden City, overloading its capacity several times over. The Great Wall, Summer Palace, Tian'anmen Square, and Beijing's aquatic museum and zoo were similarly stretched.
During the period, over 2 million visitors came to Beijing and unloaded 3.8 billion yuan ($493 million) on the city. In addition to this, 2.8 million local residents joined city tours, contributing another 365 million yuan.
As most of the city's Olympic venues will be ready by the end of the year, and more arts and cultural activities are planned, the tourist crowds may continue to swell in the coming Golden Weeks and during the Games next August.
The city has not been shy about wooing visitors with an Olympic sales pitch. About 100 million domestic and 48 million overseas visitors are expected to arrive in 2008, up from an estimated 93 million and 4.2 million this year, respectively.
But Beijing's ambition to become a tourist Mecca could well come at a price, such as "crowding out" some city residents keen to avoid the heavy levels of congestion.
Besides, the capital has long been known for vacuuming up people, investment and other resources from the provinces. While many from the city's neighboring areas regularly travel into the capital, far fewer Beijngers reciprocate.
As an indication of unattractiveness of these neighbors, the province of Hebei next door to the city has 2.7 million people living below the poverty line in 3,798 impoverished villages.
As such, it is necessary for the neighbors to work together to develop more popular tourist destinations and improve service standards in the region, which could help the areas around Beijing benefit from the multiplying effect of the Olympics.
Yet some are already seeing more visitors. Tianjin reported receiving 1 million people during this Golden Week, one third of whom came from Beijing; Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei, welcomed 787,000 visitors, 175,000 of them from Beijing.
Beijing should encourage more excursions to neighboring cities and towns to help take some of the pressure off the aging and over-strained tourism infrastructure in the capital. This will also provide absorbing holiday getaways for people like me who might want to get outside the big city during peak tourist seasons.
As a matter of fact, i have also had my fair share of disappointment with those far-flung tourist destinations.
On my way back home from Weihai earlier this month, I stopped by Qingdao, a better-known summer resort in Shandong that will host the 2008 Olympic regatta, to take a stroll on the famed Qingdao Pier.
To my horror, the century-old pier, like the city's beaches and main roads, was filled with tourists. In the distance, its octagonal pavilion, the silhouette of which can be seen on every label of Tsingtao Beer, appeared helpless amidst the crowd. Nearby, St. Michael's Cathedral, another landmark of local architecture, was charging an entry fee of 5 yuan.
I was glad that by the time I returned to Beijing, the Golden Week and the party were already over.
Email:yuanzhou@chinadaily.com.cn
