China Southern Airlines has started flights between Guangzhou and Mexico City in the first service by a local carrier to the Latin American nation. 

The 228-passenger Boeing 787 landed in Mexico City on Tuesday, after a brief stopover in Vancouver, Canada, and was welcomed on the tarmac with the customary water-cannon salute, as well as a traditional Mexican mariachi band.

According to the New Express newspaper, the new route is China Southern Airlines’ longest flight by flying time. It takes 18 hours and 45 minutes from Guangzhou to Mexico City, and one hour longer on a return trip.

The flight, which operates three times a week, sells at a minimum price of 4,800 yuan (696 US dollars) exclusive of tax. 

Prior to the opening of the new route, the only other air connection between Mexico and China was a Mexico City-to-Shanghai flight operated by Mexican national airline Aeromexico.

Mexican authorities hope the new air connection will help boost tourism from China.

"With the inauguration of the flight, we hope to see an increase in the number of Chinese visitors traveling for leisure, but also for business," Mexico's deputy minister of tourism, Salvador Sanchez, said at a ceremony at the international airport of Mexico City.

In 2016, 74,300 Chinese travelers visited Mexico, a 33.5 percent increase over the year before, according to Mexico's Tourism Ministry. The new flight is expected to raise that number to 102,000, the ministry said.