Tourism begins to revive in quake zones

Tourists swarmed to quake zones in China's Sichuan Province during the May Day Holiday weekend. In Anchang town, about a 30-minute bus ride from Beichuan's former county seat which was razed by the 8.0-magnitude earthquake a year ago, the sudden increased inflow of tourists forced local officials to put up a sign at a bridge to Anchang, persuading tourists to stop and turn back.

Customers select dresses on a local shopping street in a newly built township in Beichuan Qiang Autonomous County, southwest China's Sichuan Province, Sunday April 26, 2009. [Xinhua]

Also in Anchang, most hotels were fully packed with tourists, and prices of guestrooms rose by 50 percent in the three-day holiday.

Li Jiahua, a building material businessman from Tongliang County, Chongqing, was among the tourists. Li drove to visit the largest prefabs zone at Leigu town, also in Beichuan, May 2.

He joined a voluntary drivers' team transporting relief goods to Beichuan last year, and was assisting two quake-ravaged families there. "I just want to know how they are faring with their life, and I should have come earlier if I had time," said Li.

Tourists to Mount Qingcheng and Dujiangyan, both well-known scenic sites 68 kilometers to the west of Chengdu, rose by 30 percent from that of last year to hit at 80,000. Most of the tourists were from other parts of the country, said an official from the administration for Mount Qingcheng and Dujiangyan scenery.

Sichuan, home to giant pandas, scenic nature reserves and ancient cultures, has long been a tourist destination. The devastating earthquake on May 12 last year not only left more than 80,000 people dead or missing, but also destroyed infrastructure as well.

The devastating earthquake caused severe damage to the Wolong base, where most of the country's captive pandas were kept. Five base staff were killed, as was one captive panda. Two pandas were injured and six were missing, five of which were eventually found.

Reconstruction in quake zones remains massive and has been listed as a key task by the State Council in the forthcoming years.

Beichuan County is the only Chinese autonomous county for Qiang, a minority of just 300,000 people. The Qiang people have a unique culture that can be traced to the Shang Dynasty (1600 B.C.-1046 B.C.), and was recorded in oracle bone inscriptions. The Qiang, who call themselves "Ermea", literally "native people", are also known as the "people in the white clouds" because they usually live in ornately decorated stone houses in the upper reaches of the mountains, herding sheep and growing crops such as corn and cherries.

People take pictures of the newly-built township in Beichuan Qiang Autonomous County, southwest China's Sichuan Province, Sunday April 26, 2009. [Xinhua]

More Related Services:
Chengdu Tours