Chaotic scenes as tourists flock to top mainland scenic spots for 'golden week' holiday
Chaotic scenes at key tourist attractions for 'golden week' holiday; one couple claim they are stabbed by guards in a row over a refund
Popular tourist spots across the mainland were swamped with, in some cases, hundreds of thousands of holidaymakers during the long National Day holiday, sparking traffic mayhem and clashes between tourists and administrators.
One tourist, Dong Liwen, accused security guards at the Mount Huashan scenic area in Shaanxi of stabbing him and his wife after they asked for a refund on Tuesday because of poor service.
"I didn't expect to end my holiday in a hospital with my wife," Dong said at the People's Hospital in Huayin, where he is being treated for stab wounds. His wife was stabbed twice in an arm.
He said they had to wait for more than four hours for a downhill cable car late on Tuesday night and then had to walk for more than nine kilometres after failing to find a shuttle bus when they got to the bottom. He was attacked by about 20 people, including some security guards, after he complained to Huashan's administration office.
A spokeswoman for the sacred Taoist mountain's administration office, who refused to give her name, described Dong's complaint as an "online rumour" and would only confirm that "some tourists created a disturbance". She added that there were more than 27,000 tourists on the mountain on Tuesday, but its capacity was no more than 20,000.
She also said that about 10,000 people had been stuck on the mountain on Tuesday night and had been unable to get down until early yesterday morning.
The Ministry of Transport had earlier predicted that mainlanders would make around 740 million trips during the holiday, the longest "golden week" this year because it includes the MidAutumn Festival and the National Day holidays. The ministry was expecting an average of 82.5 million trips a day, up 8.8 per cent on the same period last year.