China's annual Ice and Snow Festival, with its fairy-tale ice sculptures, opened on Friday attracting throngs of tourists who shuffled carefully over the slippy ice and snow and dragged their children in sledges around the park. This year the ice park spans 810,000 sq metres with 250,000 cubic metres of sculptured ice, harvested from the nearby frozen Songhua River, and lit up at night with colourful lights. A woman dressed up in a costume poses for pictures in front of an ice sculpture depicting a castle, at the Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival, in Harbin, Heilongjiang province, China January 4, 2024. REUTERS/Tingshu Wang The sculptures, some a few-storeys-high, featured Chinese-style buildings and bridges, fairy-tale castles, towers and one fashioned after Beijing's T...
Read MoreDay: January 5, 2024
The Bahamas continues its meteoric rise in tourism as air and sea arrivals reach unprecedented heights, marking sustained growth that has surpassed previous years' benchmarks. As of the end of November 2023, the cumulative count of foreign air and sea arrivals soared to a staggering 8,645,374, showcasing an astounding 41.8 percent surge compared to the corresponding period in 2022. This substantial increase reflects The Bahamas' unwavering allure and growing popularity among global travellers. I. Chester Cooper, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Tourism, Investments & Aviation, lauded these remarkable achievements, highlighting the continued upward trajectory of visitor numbers. "Notably, air arrivals through November 2023, totaling 1,555,636, have eclipsed both 2022 ...
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