Since the 1980s, some primary and middle schools in Chongli set up ski classes. In 1996, Chongli had set snow sports as the key industry of the county and tourism has also developed in tandem. Now ski resorts cover 35 square km total in Chongli. The scale and quality of four resorts including Secret Garden Genting Resort, Wanlong Ski Resort, Dolomiti Mountain Resort and Changchengling Resort are among the best in China.

An official of Zhangjiakou told Beijing Review that just the possibility of being the venues of the Winter Olympic Games events has boosted their reputation as a skiing resort. In the winter of 2009 and 2010, half a million people traveled to Zhangjiakou for skiing, while between November 2013 to January 2014, the number of skiers surpassed 1 million.

Yue Zhiyun, a villager in Huangtuzui Village, runs a inn. "My inn is the closest to Wanlong Ski Resort," said Yue. "Starting in December, the inn is always full and customers need to make a reservation two or three days in advance."

Yue used to work in larger cities with his wife. In 2005, they came back to the village for the promising tourism industry. They collected 350,000 yuan ($56,872) to renovate their 17 rooms into hotel rooms. In 2005, the inn received more than 1,000 customers and made a profit of 70,000 yuan ($11,374). Then Yue expanded the inn to 37 rooms. Now they can make 300,000 yuan ($48,747) a year.

"Before 2005, my wife and I could only save a couple of thousand yuan by working hard in the cities. Now we can earn this much relying on tourism. It is almost unbelievable," said Yue.

The Chongli county government sponsored villagers who took the lead in 2004 by offering them 5,000 yuan ($812) to 10,000 yuan ($1,624). Now there are 37 home inns in the village and can accommodate more than 800 guests every day.

Advantageous

Zhangjiakou locates at the juncture of Beijing, Hebei Province, Shanxi Province and Inner Mongolia. It is only 180 km away from Beijing. It is an important source of water and ecological protection for Beijing.

"According to the current plan, Zhangjiakou will hold all the snow-based competitions except for sleigh, luge and alpine skiing of the Winter Olympic Games, which means more than half of the competitions will be held here if China wins the bid," said an official of Zhangjiakou, who also listed five advantages of the city for holding these competitions.

The first advantage on their side is that more than 150 days of the year are suitable for skiing there.

The second is convenient transportation. Only 220 km from Beijing and connected by two expressways, Zhangjiakou will also have a high-speed rail link to the capital by 2017, cutting the commute between the two cities to within 40 minutes and to the ski resorts in Chongli to within 50 minutes.

The third is that the facilities in the ski resorts are already almost all in place. Eighty-two runs have been constructed with a total of 69 km. Many of these runs have been authenticated by the International Ski Federation, with a number of international competitions already being held on them.

The fourth is that accommodation is adequate to host the athletes. By 2020, there will be more than 20 hotels in Chongli County.

Last but not least, Zhangjiakou is a very beautiful and green city. The forest coverage here is 45.6 percent and the air quality is the best among the 37 cities located north of the Yangtze River.

Email us at: zanjifang@bjreview.com