Against the backdrop of mist-shrouded skyscrapers and the modern port facilities of downtown Qingdao in East China's Shandong province, the cruise ship Europa 2 glided gracefully through turquoise waters before docking at the Qingdao Cruise Home Port on Saturday afternoon.

　　Onboard were about 460 foreign travelers, mainly from Germany, Austria and Switzerland, who embarked on their cruise journey from Shanghai a week earlier and had previously berthed at Tianjin.

　　According to Qingdao's culture and tourism bureau, the ship run by the Hamburg-headquartered Hapag-Lloyd Cruises, carried the largest inbound European tour group that Shandong has received since 2020. It is also the first international cruise ship to dock in the province this year.

　　Last year, China implemented 18 major measures to facilitate inbound foreign trips, including the current 240-hour visa-free transit eligible for foreigners from 54 countries, and 15-day visa-free group tours for cruise travel.

　　So far, the country has implemented full visa exemptions with 26 countries and unilateral visa exemptions with 38 countries. All these preferable policies have resulted in an inbound trip boom.

　　According to the National Immigration Administration, 64.88 million entries and exits were made by foreigners in 2024, marking a year-on-year growth of 82.9 percent. Among them were more than 20 million visa-free trips, which increased by 112.3 percent year-on-year.

　　Data from the National Bureau of Statistics show that foreign travelers spent $94.2 billion in China last year, increasing by 77.8 percent year-on-year, while statistics from the Ministry of Natural Resources demonstrate that the marine tourism industry achieved an added value of 1.6 trillion yuan ($221 billion), a year-on-year increase of 9.2 percent.