Beijing Develops High-Tech Tours

High-tech tours are new tourist programs provided for visitors to institutes of higher learning, a visit to the space center and viewing acupuncture treatment.

During the Beijing High-Tech Industries' International Week, held in late May, the Beijing Municipality Tourism Administration provided a great number of tourism products with the aim of showing the social changes and scientific progress China has achieved.

Now five high-tech tours are available in Beijing. During the agricultural base tour, with agricultural technology and the Summer Palace as the focus, visitors can not only enjoy themselves in the imperial garden, but also tour the genetic engineering lab and embryo cultivation center of the agricultural base.The tour to the Great Wall at Badaling, the Ming Tombs and China Space Center will help tourists to learn more about scientific addition to a view of modern space equipment. Tourists who go to the Palace Museum, Temple of Heaven and Beijing Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital will have a chance to watch Chinese doctors treating patients with acupuncture and moxibustion methods. They will learn something about traditional Chinese medicine and pharmacology, in addition to having a chance to experience traditional Chinese massage. Participants in the tour of the Yuanmingyuan Park, Agricultural Base and Beijing University will visit the biological lab and protein genetic engineering lab, of which Professor Chen Zhanglian of Beijing University is in charge, the information technology lab and the library of Beijing University.

Guizhou Celebrates Six Festivals

Eulogized as the "Museum of Chinese ethnic festivals," Qiandongnan Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture in southeastern Guizhou Province has made preparations for six festivals centered around China Ecotour'99, which started in May this year.

The festivals this year are on an unprecedentedly large scale. The Miao Sisters Festival was held in Taijiang County from April 28 to May 1,999. It featured song-and -dance performances, sales exhibition of costumes, personal adornments and folk art works popular in the locality, shows of traditional wedding customs, dragon-boat races, bull fighting, bird fighting, cock fighting and sports competitions.

On June 18 and 19, a Dragon-Boat Race Festival was organized in Zhenyuan, one of the famous cultural and historical cities in China. At the same time, trade talks with the purpose of attracting more foreign investment were sponsored, in addition to a dragon-worship ceremony and enjoyment of river scenery from pleasure boats.

The Shanmu River Drifting Festival, slated to open on June 5 in Shibing County, will end on August 21, 1999. During the International Lusheng Festival, scheduled for August 18 to 29 at Kaili, there will be bull fighting and fights between over 50pairs of birds. On sale will be cross-stitch embroidery works and crafts made out of batik material. Song-and -dance performances will be given by ethnic minorities, and there will be local products exhibitions and trade fairs to attract both tourists and overseas investors.

The Tangerine Festival is scheduled for November 21 to 24 in Guizhou Province's Congjiang. During this period, activities will include song-and-dance performances by ethnic Dong artists, bull fighting, reed-pipe wind instrument playing by Miao and Dong musicians, evaluation and sales of high-quality tangerines, and campfire parties.

New Finds at Great Wall

A 1,000-meter-long brick wall structure bearing literary inscriptions, and another covered with relief work have been found at the Jinshanling section of the Great Wall.

According to experts, the inscriptions concern information such as the time when the bricks were made and details about the troops that built this section of the Great Wall.

The relief wall structure is dominated by the pattern of the kylin (a fabulous deer-like animal said to appear only in times of peace and prosperity). The structure also has patterns of white deer and glossy ganoderma (a kind of dark brownish fungus supposed to have supernatural powers).

The Jinshanling section of the Great Wall, 10.5 kilometers long, is located in Hebei Province, and was first built during the Ming Dynasty(1368-1644).

Three Gorges Attracts More Overseas Visitors

The number of overseas tourists to the famous Three Gorges on the Yangtze River from early May increased by 29 percent over the same period of last year.

Wang Qingyu, director of the tourism administration of Chongqing Municipality in southwest China, said that the city, which is located in the Three Gorges area, has received nearly 2,000 overseas tourists each day since May 7.

From May 7to 21, Fengjie County, the start of the Three Gorges, received more than 1,000 overseas tourists, mostly from the United States, Germany, France, Britain and Australia.

Great Efforts Made to Restore Ancient Pingyao City

Tourism departments in Shanxi Province are taking active measures to develop Pingyao City, which is on the UN's World Cultural Heritage list. The Shanxi Provincial Tourism Administration will invest 2.2 million yuan in constructing infrastructure facilities in the ancient city.

Travel agencies in Shanxi Province and the Pingyao Tourism Bureau are working together to designing the Pingyao City Gate, tourism streets, residential dwellings, and scenic sports with typical local folklore characteristics. THe next three years will see special efforts made to promote Pingyao's tourism sector.

International Elderly Tourism Day

Shijiazhuang City in Hebei Province will hold International Elderly Tourism Festival from September 8 to 10. The main activities will include selection of "Century Elderly"and "Healthy Elderly," century Elderly" and "Healthy Elderly", celebration of golden and silver weddings; keep-fit activities; visits by overseas visitors to China's universities, homes and apartments for the elderly; old people's activity centers, homes with longevity members; and demonstrations of painting, calligraphy, and making of arts and crafts.