Tourists visit a popular tourism spot in Southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on April 16, 2023. As the five-day May Day holidays draw near, many places around China have entered a warming-up period with soaring tourist arrivals. The "hottest" travel season in five years is expected, with bookings rising as much as 200 percent from 2019, said online travel platforms. Photo: VCG

 
As China's first post-epidemic May Day holidays are around the corner, people across the country are geared up preparing themselves for the long-awaited trips at home or abroad. With a nervous yet excited mood, they rushed online to book hotels, grab train or air tickets, and snap up restaurant reservations, as China sees a full rebound of the travel industry that has not only surpassed  COVID-hit years but is even ahead of pre-epidemic times. 

In the Chinese capital, transport authorities said on Tuesday that Beijing is expected to see a significant increase of trips to and from Beijing during this year's May Day holidays, also known as "the golden week," which lasts for five days from April 29 to May 3. Both the traffic volume and passenger flow are expected to exceed the level of the same period in 2019, before the epidemic struck. 

At a press conference addressing the dynamics of the tourism sector in Beijing, officials said that tourist attractions, performance venues and other entertainment venues in the city will be open and at maximum capacity.

Various travel agencies reflected that less than 10 days before the holiday, booking volumes for domestic flights, hotels and scenic spot tickets have all surpassed the 2019 level. Fliggy, one of the mainstream online agencies, said the cumulative bookings of May Day holiday products have increased more than 10 times year-on-year as of Tuesday. 

Hotel rooms are in such tight supply that some operators have launched a new product - sleeping on the couch in the hall for 99 yuan ($14.3) per night. 

When reaching the Wanda Hotel in Taizhou, East China's Zhejiang Province, which offers the new product online, representatives told media that their new product was sold out during the "golden week." 

As of Tuesday, the search enquires for domestic air tickets during the holidays  exceeded the same period in 2022 by more than 290 percent and recovered to 110 percent of the same period in 2019, Ctrip, a major online travel agency in China, disclosed.

The need for accommodation industry has also far exceeded expectations, with search queries for domestic hotels reaching more than nine times of the same period in 2022, and nearly twofold over the same period in 2019.

Apart from domestic travels, overseas trips also regained strong momentum for the upcoming holidays. According to Fliggy data, outbound travel bookings have hit a new peak, up more than 200 percent compared with the Spring Festival holidays this January. 

China's Hong Kong, Thailand, Japan, South Korea and Australia are among the most popular destinations, while Egypt, UAE, Italy and France are also seeing a rapid growth. 

Thanks to the continued decline in the prices of cross-border air tickets, the unit prices of outbound travel dropped nearly half compared with last year.

Hong Kong media reported that during the May Day holidays, the number of flights from the Chinese mainland increased by more than 15 times year-on-year.