“I made a special trip from Yiwu, and I was so excited that I didn’t fall asleep for one night!” In the departure hall of ningbo lishe international airport, Mr. Lou was holding his passport and ticket, unable to restrain his happiness.
“Spring is coming soon, and my mood is one word, cool!” Before entering the security check, Li Wenyang, a tour guide, said with a smile.
On the morning of February 10th, the “starting group” after the restart of Ningbo outbound team tour set off for Bangkok, starting a five-night, six-day journey. “Our flight from Ningbo to Bangkok has 185 seats, all of which are full, and 60 of them are our group tourists.” Yang Shipei, general manager of an international travel agency in Zhejiang, said that the flights for the next week are basically fully booked.
The enthusiasm of the tourism market has continued from the first day of the first month to this day. According to Ctrip data, as of February 7th, the order volume of booking cross-border air tickets in February-March increased by 87% compared with the previous two months, and the order volume of overseas hotels increased by 52% compared with the previous two months, and the outbound travel momentum continued to be hot.
Go! Common expectations
Mr. Lou told reporters that he had not traveled abroad for five years, and he immediately signed up when he learned that the outbound team tour had resumed.
In addition to joining the group, there are also tourists rushing to resume the Ningbo-Bangkok route, catching the first flight and changing the way to “try early”.
Mr. Xu and Ms. Ma of Ningbo are full of expectations for this three-year trip. They said that in addition to seeing the famous scenic spots in Thailand, they also wanted to experience the “other blue” of the sea.
“I used to travel abroad twice a year, but I have been’ stopped’ for three years due to the epidemic.” Ms. Ma said, “We decided to join the tour immediately after our friends who worked in the travel agency told us the date of the’ starting tour’.”
As a tourism practitioner, being able to start with a group again is not only joy, but also confidence in the recovery of tourism. Xiao Xi, the leader of Ningbo, will lead more than 20 group members in this trip. In his words, a series of work such as contact and information check before departure seems to be “three years ago yesterday”.
After the news of the pilot recovery of outbound group tour was sent out, travel agencies launched tourism products overnight, and the related consultation volume also increased greatly. Xiao Xi, the team leader, also received many inquiries about outbound travel.
“In the past two years, I have kept in touch with my friends who are engaged in tourism abroad and kept abreast of the situation abroad.” Xiao Xi said that everything is relatively stable at present, but safety is always the most important thing. He laughed and said that he will always “talk” to ensure the safe and smooth travel of the group members.
When he was about to enter the border inspection, Xiao Xi waved a small flag in his hand, which read “Spring Tour”. For tourists, the sunshine in Bangkok is as warm as spring; For tourism practitioners, this journey marked as “the first launch” ushered in the spring of the industry.
Next stop, where to go?
In a picture of “World Travel Calendar” circulated before, the one-year outbound travel plan was clearly arranged. February.Go to Zermatt powder snow paradise in Switzerland to run wild; In March, I watched the funny “Green Hat Festival” in Dublin, Ireland …
Although the destinations listed in this calendar are all over five continents, for most tourists, “farther away” does not mean to leave, but to wait and see.
“In the short term, Southeast Asia is still the first choice for many tourists to travel abroad.” The reporter learned from the relevant person in charge of the travel agency that one of the reasons is that the outbound group tour is still in the pilot stage. In addition, the route is still a more important factor affecting the promotion of outbound tourism products and tourists’ willingness to travel.
It is understood that since the implementation of the “Overall Plan for Implementing” Class B and B Management “for novel coronavirus Infection, the international flight volume has accelerated to recover. According to the data of Ctrip’s FlightAI market insight platform, the cross-border flight volume from January 8 to February 7 increased by 47% compared with the previous month. Since February, the number of cross-border flights has recovered to 13 in the same period of 2019..1%。 According to Ctrip’s latest go-around flight statistics from February to March, the weekly average planned flights will recover by more than 18% compared with the same period in 2019.
Sun Yu, business manager of Ningbo Airport Market Development Department, told the reporter that Bangkok was one of the earliest international cities where Ningbo Airport was open to navigation. “Before the epidemic, outbound tourists to Bangkok accounted for 15% of all outbound tourists, and the passenger flow was second only to Hong Kong.” He said that there are four flights a day from Ningbo Airport to Bangkok during the peak period.
As the “heat” of outbound travel rises, Ningbo’s passenger routes are also constantly being woven. “We have opened flights from Ningbo to Macau, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Bangkok, and the planned number of flights per week has reached 15. After that, we will continue to promote the recovery of the passenger transport market. ” Sun Yu said.
Yang Shipei told reporters that in order to facilitate the travel of citizens and tourists, passenger routes from Ningbo to Phuket, Chiang Mai, Cambodia and Singapore will be resumed as planned in the future.
“Next, we will also consider increasing the routes from Ningbo to Nagoya, Osaka, Seoul and Jeju.” Yang Jingli said.
(Editor: Ye Binde, Kang Mengqi)
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