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Hefei city in Anhui province made thorough tourism preparations prior to Spring Festival. Self-driving tours, relative-visiting tours and short-line tours were the most popular choices. Impacted by weather conditions, the number of tourists in the city resembled an inverted v: falling after reaching its peak.
Hefei organized colorful folk activities to celebrate the New Year. For instance, Sanhe town held a cultural art festival in which tourists enjoyed a themed lantern show, Luzhou operas and the temple fair. A total of 149,000 tourists arrived, 10 percent more than the number last year. Overall income reached 26.8 million yuan, 21 percent higher than last year. The New Year celebration activities in Chenghuang Temple and Anhui Emblem also attracted a large number of tourists.
Hot spring tours were also popular during the festival. Prayer activities in Yefu Mountain and West Cottage Temple also attracted many tourists. Educational tours were no less popular. For example, the Three-Kingdoms Sites Park held a horse culture themed exhibition and three kingdoms relic exhibition, and the science museum held a 4D movie exhibition.
Before Spring Festival, Hefei city held its sixth shopping festival. The 30,000 square meter exhibition area was divided into 16 parts, and businesses from all over the world joined the exhibition. In 10 days, 1.1 million people spent over 600 million yuan ($99.03 million).
During the festival, the travel market operated smoothly. The Hefei Tourism Bureau worked around the clock to make sure the complaint hotline was always open. By 4:00pm on February 6, 15 consultations and two complaints had been handled. No major safety accidents occurred during the festival.
Except for the decrease in highway traffic, waterway, railway and air transportation all accommodated more passengers than the past. Businesses in Hefei city generally performed better than last year, though the performance of the catering industry was roughly the same as last year.
Edited by Michael Thai, Huang Pei
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