Central China to renovate summer resort to lure more visitors

A local Chinese government and China's largest tourism company have agreed to join hands to renovate Jigong Mountain summer resort in central China, so as to attract more visitors.

The city government of Xinyang said Friday it has signed a 3- billion-yuan (452 million U.S. dollars) deal with China National Travel Service (HK) Group Corp. to build the resort on Jigong Mountain, a well-known tourist attraction in Henan Province, where foreign missionaries built villas during the late Qing Dynasty (1644-1912).

The resort will have villas, a helipad and a golf course.

The company will take three to five years to renovate 109 existing villas that were built in the mountain by foreign missionaries before 1929.

Xinyang has also pooled investments worth another 10 billion yuan to develop an animation industrial park, a movie production base and a Buddhist temple.

Jigong Mountain got its name as its peak looks like a rooster stretching its neck out to welcome the new day.

The mountain stands between Henan and Hebei provinces.

An American pastor was infatuated by the beauty of the mountain in 1902 and introduced it to other foreign missionaries and diplomats living in Hankou City, which was then a concession zone ceded by the Qing imperial empire to the foreigners.

Some 509 villas were built for as many as 2,200 foreign missionaries and their relatives. The missionaries were from America, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Sweden, Spain and Portugal.

Source: Xinhua