In recent years, southwest Hunan’s Tongdao Dong Autonomous County has vigorously developed leisure agriculture and rural tourism. Its forest coverage rate has exceeded 75%.Last year, 785,000 tourists visited Tongdao and brought tourism revenue of 470 million yuan, rising by 23.2% and 54% respectively year on year. Tongdao was acclaimed as the national demonstration county of leisure agriculture and rural tourism at the end of last year.The county has invested 350 million yuan in the upgrading of 4A-level Dong Nationality Cultural Village of Huangdu, the construction of the peak area of Wanfo Mountain, the transformation of roads in Shuangqing and Jingtong, and the building of other supporting projects.At present, the county has developed 12 key leisure agriculture and rural tourism towns and townships, 15 leisure agriculture demonstration villages, and 28 leisure agriculture enterprises. Puxiu Bridge in Huangdu and Yutou Ancient Dong Village have been included in China’s eight items of classic village landscape and 15 landscape villages respectively.Translator: Lv XuefenSource: Hunan Official Web Portal

News 2013-02-18 01:19 View：957

Entering into the zhangjiajie national forest park, it was full of warm and peaceful atmosphere. The warm blessing and happy banner were full of streets. The dragon lantern, the cheers of the lion’s dancing burst. In the tickets station, electronic screen showed the weather forecast and the distribution of the tourists for tourists.With good policy influence, self-driving from high-speed of changsha to zhangjiajie into the national forest park increased gradually. Guangdong, chongqing, and other foreign licence vehicle was in the majority. In huangshi village, JinBian river, YuanJiaJie and other scenic areas, tourists belonged to guangdong, Hong Kong, it also had a lot of tourists in Europe and America.Translated by Sophia

News 2013-02-17 01:24 View：1029

From February 8 (Lunar December 28) to February 13 (Lunar January 4) of 2013, Lorenzo, an oral English teacher from Italy in the Senior Middle School of Longshan County (in Western Hunan), with his father Romano and his mother Michela who came from Milan of Italy for visiting, spent an unforgettable Spring Festival with local people.During the stay in Longshan, a county inhibited by Tujia Minority, they followed local custom of pasting the spring couplets to welcome the New Year and tasted the specialty foods of Tujia Minority, experiencing the unique Tujia culture of China.Romano and Michela left the county with wistful farewell on February 13. Nevertheless, the hospitality of local people and distinctive local customs of pasting spring couplets and celebrating the Spring Festival had remained fresh in their memory.Lorenzo (right) and his father Romano (middle) and his mother Michela (left) are pasting the spring couplets to welcome the New Year in a household of Tujia Minority.Lorenzo merrily pastes the spring couplets.Translator: Wang BilianSource: Hunan Official Web Portal

News 2013-02-17 01:21 View：993

On February 11, light rain was falling and temperature going down. However, at the Mark Gate Square in Wulingyuan District was presenting a hot atmosphere. Tug-of-War competition, sponsored by district government and undertook by district bureau of culture and sports, greatly enriched people’s spare-time culture life and created an atmosphere of joy and harmony for Spring Festival.About 120 persons represented by 7 groups participated in this competition. At the scene of competition, mixed with misty rain and cold breeze, members of competition teams strived to pull at hear of whistle sound with cheering squad’s enthusiastic cry and shouting.In the competition, women and men were mixed together. Based on principle of “friendship first, contest second”, finally the first, second and third prize gone to participants from neighborhood committee of Suoxiyu County, Yujiazui and Wenfeng after half a day’s fierce rivalry.By Patricia

News 2013-02-16 00:26 View：1107

On February 11, the third day of golden week during Spring Festival, Yellow Dragon Cave scenic spot on ecological square displayed custom culture of Tujia nationality people making Glutinous Rice Cake symbolizing reunion and luck.Making Glutinous Rice Cake, as one of New Year’s custom which has been handed down by Tujia people in ZJJ for thousands of years, usually is made of steamed glutinous rice cake knocked about in a special designed stone groove and is of high labor intensity. At the scene of making Glutinous Rice Cake, a lot of tourists were attracted to stop to watch and not a few tourists even actively participated in making it to experience traditional folk culture of ZJJ people.During Spring Festival, Yellow Dragon Cave region had held Festive Lantern and Folk Song performances. And they gained a vast of tourists’ favor and good reputation.By Patricia

News 2013-02-15 00:23 View：1148

Over 1,000 visitors from home and abroad were impressed by the cloud-capped mountains and beautiful snowscape in the Wulingyuan Scenic Spot of Zhangjiajie on the morning of February 10.Attributed to the preferential policy of exempting 7-seat passenger cars from road tolls during the Spring Festival and fine weather after the heavy snow, Zhangjiajie attracted numbers of visitors from Guangdong, Hong Kong and even Europe. They could enjoy not only beautiful scenery and delicious food of the Tujia ethnic group but also various folk performances such as festival lantern, dragon dance and the Yangxi Opera from February 10 to 24.Translator: Wang XiaoluSource: Hunan Official Web Portal

News 2013-02-15 00:11 View：971

On February 10, 2013, it’s a big sunny day in Wulingyuan. At about 3 p.m. that very day, about 50 persons including secretary of district committee Zhu Yongwen, deputy secretary of district committee and district mayor Zhu Xinnian, deputy warden Denjian and all walks of life came to Helong Garden of Mount Tianzi to worship Supreme Commander Helong.Zhu Yongwen and other people respectfully present a basket of flowers to Marshal Helong and all people bowed three times to him in order to express people’s measureless admire and advocate and pass on fighting spirit of elder revolutionist and boost construction of international tour and leisure holiday zone in Wulingyuan.Marshal Helong is the supreme commander for new China’s founding and ZJJ’s pride as well for that he was once a residence in ZJJ. Thousands of local citizens and tourists are absorbed here to worship Helong during Spring Festival every year.By Patricia

News 2013-02-14 00:21 View：1604

Yesterday being the fourth day of the Golden Week of the Spring Festival, the Hunan Provincial Holiday Office released statistics that 42 provincially-monitored tourism areas or sites had received a total of 457,700 tourists, among which most drove their own vehicles, an increase of 3.4% compared with the same time of the previous year. The office said that tourism profits achieved great growth, with 33,992,300 yuan in tourism revenue, up 44% compared to 2012. The top ten areas receiving the most tourists were: the Shaoshan (Birthplace of Mao Zedong), Yuelu Mountain, Hengshan Mountain (Southern Mountain), Yueyang Tower and Junshan Island, Zhijiang (Site of the Japanese Surrender), Wujian Mountain (National Forest Park), Memorial Hall of Comrade Liu Shaoqi, Ancient Commercial Town of Hongjiang, Jiuyi Mountain (a famous mountain in Yongzhou) and Emperor Yan Mausoleum.Yesterday Changsha saw a sharp increase in visitors to its major historical districts and other popular sites. It's estimated that 233,500 tourists were received in Changsha yesterday and that tourism revenue reached 222 million yuan, a year-on-year growth of 16.8% and 37.8% respectively.Translator: Zhu MengxiaSource: Hunan Official Web Portal

News 2013-02-14 00:11 View：901