Foreign travel new flavor of Spring Festival holidays

Sales at some South Korean department stores witnessed a 70-percent growth in sales during the festival, local media reports say.

At least 1 million Chinese made trips to Thailand during the festival, up 19 percent year-on-year, the country's tourism authority says. Tourism spending there during the period by the Chinese is expected to hit 5.58 billion yuan, up 32 percent year-on-year.

Thailand's airlines put on at least 8,700 more flights to and from China during this year's holiday.

Island destinations were especially favored by Chinese travelers.

The number of Chinese tourists visiting Fiji, Tahiti and Seychelles doubled during the holiday, Ctrip reports.

Destinations in Southeast Asia were also high on the list for their friendly visa policies, Ctrip's publicity manager Yan Xin says.

Thailand provides multiple-entry visas for up to six months to all foreign visitors, Vietnam reduced its single-entry visa fee from $45 to $25 late last year, while Malaysia is allowing visa-free visits for Chinese travelers from March 1 to Dec 31.

On the home front, 302 million Chinese traveled to the mainland during the seven-day Spring Festival holiday, up 15.6 percent compared with the same period last year, the National Tourism Administration reports.

Tourism income stood at 365.1 billion yuan, up 16.3 percent from a year earlier.

Domestic flights carried 8.6 million passengers, up 3 percent year-on-year.

China Southern Airlines (not including Xiamen Airlines) carried 1.5 million passengers, including 920,000 outbound tourists, up 14 percent on year.

China Eastern Airlines says it carried 1.9 million tourists, but no comparative figure was available.

Beijing, Xiamen and Sanya were the most popular domestic getaways during the holiday.