China Island Romance

Located in the tropical area at the southern end of China, Hainan is warm all year round and has no winter. Besides, it boasts soft beaches and beautiful tropical scenery, which make it a famous holiday resort in China. 

Its administrative regions are Hainan Island, Xisha archipelago, Zhongsha archipelago and Nansha archipelago. The whole province occupies a land area of 35,000 square kilometers (13,510 square miles) and a sea area of 2,000,000 square kilometers (772,000 square miles). 

The main island, Hainan Island, which is shaped like a giant elliptical pear, is China's largest island after Taiwan. The capital Haikou City is situated in northern part of the island. It is the political, economic, cultural and transportation center of the whole province. The other prefecture-level city of the province is Sanya, which is a hot destination for tourism.

Belonging to the northern part of the tropics and virtually at the same latitude as Hawaii, Hainan has a tropical monsoon climate and is known as the 'Eastern Hawaii'. Its average annual temperature is 23-25°C while the average temperature of the coldest February ranges between 16-20°C and the hottest August between 35-39°C. 

When northern China is full of snow, local people are able to swim in the sea and enjoy the warm sunshine on the beach. In addition, the island has beautiful soft beaches and tropical scenery such as Holiday Beach, Dongzhai Harbor Mangrove Natural Reserve Area, Dongjiao Coconut Plantation, Asian Dragon Bay and Wuzhizhou Island.

 All these help to make the island a holiday hot spot in China, especially in winters and for newly-married couples. A special mention must be made here of the fact that since 2008, the government has been making a great effort to develop this tropical island province into an international tourism destination. 

On December 30, 2010, the first high-speed rail of the area, Hainan Eastern Ring Rail was put into service. Now people can travel easily between the northern point of the island (Haikou) and its southern point (Sanya) in just 1.5 hours. Another effort made by the government is the tax rebate program for tourists introduced from January 1, 2011.