(Yicai) April 18 -- Trips to small, lesser-known towns are proving popular over the upcoming five-day Labor Day holiday on online travel platforms such as Trip.com Group and Tongcheng Travel as many young Chinese people opt to venture off the beaten track.

Trips to fourth-tier and smaller cities, especially county-level regions, have jumped over the break, which runs from May 1 to May 5, according to the 2024 May Day travel trends report released by Trip.com yesterday.

In county-level regions, hotel bookings surged 68 percent from a year earlier, and ticket purchases for scenic spots soared two-and-a-half-fold, higher than the national average, the report said. This will help boost tourism spending in these areas.

Purchases of train and airplane tickets to third-tier and smaller cities on April 29 and April 30 more than tripled from a week earlier, said Suzhou-based Tongcheng.

Young people tend to prefer niche and unique travel experiences these days, unlike the earlier trend for group tours to crowded scenic spots, Peng Peng, executive chairman of the Guangdong Provincial Society of Economic Reform, told Yicai. So there has been an uptick in visitors to small towns.

An increase in car ownership has also meant people can venture further, a person living in Anxi county, southeastern Fujian province told Yicai. Many families in the countryside now own vehicles, so young people can take their families to neighboring attractions during their time off.

Many people who do not travel or rarely travel have started traveling but their spending power will not be as high as that of frequent travelers, Peng said. And the relatively low cost of tours in small cities, will, to a certain extent, lower per capita tourism spending.

But, overall, tourism spending in the country will continue to expand, which is a very important structural change in the tourism industry and will help boost the economy, he added.

Editor: Kim Taylor