The 19th Asian Games will kick off in East China’s Hangzhou on September 23. The city known for the natural beauty and historic relics of the West Lake, is preparing to welcome more tourists.
Data from Alibaba’s online travel agency Fliggy showed the number of flight bookings during the Hangzhou Asian Games period has increased more than two-fold compared to the same period last year, and hotel bookings have increased more than four-fold year-on-year.
More than 53.2 million tourists visited Hangzhou in the first half of this year, up 64.5 percent year on year. As the Games will be held during the National Day holiday, Hangzhou is expecting over 10 million tourists.
Tickets are hard to come by. The pre-sale of tickets for the Asian Games sports events was concluded by August 6, and more than a million tickets were sold. Since the start of real-time ticket sales on August 14, more than half of the events have already sold out of tickets.
