China sees holiday travel boom as scenic spots sell out on the 1st day

China's golden week holiday exploded into motion on Wednesday as millions of travelers hit the roads, rails and skies, turning the first day of the National Day–Mid-Autumn Festival break into a nationwide travel spectacle.

This year, the Mid-Autumn Festival falls within the National Day holiday, extending the break to eight days, with many people taking extra leave to stretch it into a 12-day vacation.

The Ministry of Transport estimated that nationwide passenger trips could surpass 340 million on October 1 alone, with total cross-regional travel during the holiday expected to reach 2.36 billion.

With this year's rare eight-day holiday, long-haul trips are especially popular. Online travel platforms reported record bookings: Tuniu logged a 130 percent jump in domestic travel compared with the previous day, while Qunar said October 1 marked the peak for air travel. Hotels were booked in nearly 2,000 counties across China and more than 3,000 overseas cities.

The surge has pushed many attractions to capacity. Jiuzhaigou National Park announced on September 30 that tickets for October 1–6 had reached the daily limit of 41,000 and were sold out. On October 1, the park confirmed tickets for October 2–6 were also fully booked across all online platforms. Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding likewise reported tickets sold out from October 2–4, with limited availability on October 5 and 6.

Major museums have also run out of tickets, including the National Museum of China, the Palace Museum, the Shaanxi History Museum, the Nanjing Museum and the Hunan Museum.

Inbound tourism is also on the rise. Qunar said foreign visitor arrivals grew by more than 40 percent year on year on the first day of the holiday, with flights landing in 70 Chinese cities. Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou were the top destinations, with South Korea, Japan and Malaysia among the leading source countries.