Chinese tourists are significantly stringing together numerous locations throughout the weeklong National Day vacation, improving mid-holiday flight and drawing more visitors to smaller sized cities and counties.
More than 20% of air tourists scheduled flights to 2 or more locations throughout the vacation, which ranges from Oct. 1 to Oct. 7, according to online travel platform Tongcheng Travel. Need for flights in the middle of the vacation increased 35% from a year previously.
Smaller sized locations were amongst the greatest recipients of the vacation travel boom, with information from travel platform Qunar revealing that its 10 leading trending picturesque areas were all in county-level locations.
In Qilian County in northwestern Qinghai province, which has a population of about 50,000, more than 100,000 travelers showed up on Oct. 3, filling regional hotels and triggering authorities to house almost 500 stranded visitors in school dorm rooms as temperature levels was up to minus 4 degrees Celsius and snow covered close-by mountaintops.
The county’s culture and tourist department got more than 400 calls for assistance in 7 hours, according to regional authorities. Posts on Xiaohongshu, the way of life app likewise called RedNote, revealed travelers looking for spaces as hotels throughout the county filled.
One tourist informed domestic outlet Jimu News that he invested the afternoon and night browsing significant reservation platforms after showing up in Qilian from Xi’a however might not discover a space. After seeing a notification from regional tourist authorities, he called for assistance and was designated a school dorm space shared by 4 individuals, with brand-new bed linen supplied.
Wansui Mountain Martial Arts City in main Henan province likewise had problem with heavy crowds, consistently topping admissions and suspending same-day ticket sales after interest rose 22-fold from a year previously.
Numerous tourists were likewise going further and keeping away longer. According to Tongcheng Travel, individuals on multi-city journeys went to approximately 1.2 more cities than in 2025, with Chengdu, Suzhou, and Wuhan amongst the busiest transfer centers.
More than 70% of multi-city tourists reserved both natural and cultural tourist attractions, recommending that numerous were integrating various kinds of locations within a single travel plan.
Interest in 6- to 10-day groups and personalized trips to locations consisting of Xinjiang, Sichuan, Yunnan, and Guizhou increased more than 60% on Tongcheng from a year previously. Couples and households represented over half of those reservations.
(Header image: Tourists go to the Zhuo’er Mountain Scenic Area in Qilian County, Qinghai province, Oct. 1, 2026. VCG)
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