After the summer time tourist booming season met its end, prices of outbound tours and domestic travels went in different directions. Domestic tours began to go down while outbound travels began to see prices climbing up, the Legal Evening News reported.

Several large travel agencies in Beijing began to cut down prices of domestic tours starting from yesterday. On the other hand, prices for outbound travels began to reflect the rising trend of the coming National Day holiday.

Outbound tours to Southeast Asian nations saw a rise in price since tourists sites in these regions have resumed normal operation after being struck by natural disasters.

Trips to Europe and African countries also cost more. An eight-day trip to South Africa, for example, costs 2,000 yuan more than in August. According to travel agencies, the rising of ticket fares contributes mainly to the price hike.

Domestic travels, however, began to go down in prices with the summer time travel boom coming to an end.

The Kanghui International Travel Agency offered more discounts for the air tickets to Chengdu, thus bringing down the whole price of the trip.

A trip to the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region now costs 4,500 yuan, from the previous 4,680 yuan.

However, information from travel agencies shows that price of domestic travel will begin to climb from mid-September.

Employees at the travel agencies estimated the hot spots for the coming National Day holidays would be Yunnan, Sichuan and Xiamen city.

Sceneries such as Jiuzhaigou, Zhangjiajie and Wuyi Mountain, which were affected by typhoon earlier,return to normal operations and travel to these places now will be a good buy.

(Chinanews.cn August 24, 2005)