Sanya, a picturesque city on the southern end of China's Hainan Island, famous for its bays with beach resorts, is wooing the Indian tourists who love adventure and duty-free shopping, officials have said.
"We welcome the Indian tourists with open arms. We have world class facilities here, secondly we have very good environment, there is clean air and we have no pollution, the sea water is pure and tourists can do a lot of shopping here," Vice Mayor of Sanya City Council, Wu Peng told visiting journalists from India and some Asean countries here.
Sanya boasts of some top-of-the-line hotel chains who have set up shop along the beaches here.
Apart from being famous for its beach resorts, the tropical paradise is also famous for duty-free shopping.
"The tourists love the sun-kissed beaches and pollution-free environment here. Tourism is Sanya's pillar industry," he said.
Wu Peng also said that in 2015, there were about 50 million tourists who visited Sanya.
"The revenue from tourists industry was up to about 30 billion Yuan," he said.
The inflow of tourists is not only from China's mainland now and many foreign tourists flock this town, said Wang Feifei, Deputy Director of the Sanya Tourism Development Commission.
She said there is Sanya Phoenix International Airport and flights to several destinations operate from there.
"The place is also a heaven for those who like seafood," she added.
Sanya also has a lot to offer for the shoppers.
Notably, nearly one-and-a-half years back, China had opened world's largest duty-free shop (DFS), attracting several international brands, in Sanya city.
Located in the Haitang Bay area the duty-free shopping centre has an area of 72,000 square metres.
"People are now moving beyond the established tourist destinations. They want to try out new places and when they visit Sanya they will realise that it has so much to offer," said George Jin, a local tour guide.
Notably, the town is also well-connected by rail route. China's Hainan Island Circling high-speed railway is the world's first HSR circling an island in tropical zone.
The 653-km rail belt connects Haikou in the north to Sanya in the south.
Since 2003, Sanya has hosted Miss World beauty pageant six times.
