Three Gorges tour offered at low prices
17/6/2003 16:57
A cruise sightseeing tour to the new Three Gorges along the Yangtze
River is being offered at up to 40 percent off during a promotion that started
last weekend, the Chongqing Business Times reported.
Chongqing Changjiang
River Water Transport Co Ltd, operator of the Three Gorges water transport, has
announced that the promotion will run through the end of this month.
The
company is hoping to rebuild the Three Gorges tour brand and draw more visitors
to the world famous scenic venue.
During the event, prices for 11 luxury
cruisers operated by the company will be slashed, with that of a down river
third-class trip from Chongqing, Sichuan Province, to Yichang, Hubei Province,
down from 270 yuan (US$33) to 175.5 yuan, which is even cheaper than a regular
passenger ship tour of 250 yuan between the two points.
Normal charges on
the luxury liners are 578 yuan and 1,371 yuan respectively for the second-class
and first-class services.
Meanwhile, the travel arm of the Changjiang
Water Transport has also announced a cheaper packaged trip to the Three Gorges
from Chongqing.
The weekend three-day trip will be offered from next week
at 1,580 yuan, a price covering airfare, bus transport, dining and admission
tickets to the scenic spots.
The charge is just over half of the market
price.
"We hope the low-price tours will help refuel Three Gorges
tourism, which has cooled due to the construction of the dam there," said Cui
Min, vice general of the tour agency.
The dam started to store water last
week and transport has been restored. The first sightseeing ship tour after the
Three Gorges project has been initially completed will be made this week from
Chongqing to Yichang.
A-share listed Changjiang Water Transport rewrote
its strategy three years ago to move from its dominant passenger transport
business to sightseeing services.
It has achieved the goal in the first
part of this year after investing 100 million yuan to phase out all its 30-odd
passenger ships and upgrade some of them to luxury sightseeing
cruisers.
Jane Chen / Shanghai Daily news
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