Ancient travellers often felt inconvenient in long-distance journeys. For example, it took nearly 4 years for Marco Polo to trek from Venice to Xanadu (i.e. today’s Beijing), the capital of China in the Yuan Dynasty, and approximately 70 days for Columbus to sail from Spain’s Puerto Barros to Central America’s Bahamas Islands. Over thousands of years, travellers sustained their efforts to gain insights into the world and break geographical barriers, by carriage, rickshaw, pleasure-boat or sailing boat.

Amid the Industrial Revolution, steam-driven trains and ships put an end to the era when travels relied on carriages and sailing ships. On September 27, 1825, Darlington-Stockton Railway, the world’s first railway, was born in the UK with a speed (48km/h) much higher than that of a carriage (approx. 8km/h); in 1840, the cruise ship Britannia set out from Liverpool and carried its first-batch passengers to Boston, marking that cruise tours appeared on the scene. Enabled by much shorter traveling time and much lower traveling expenses, tours became increasingly popular worldwide, and reached out to the masses. By revolutionizing ways of travel, modern means of transportation bring tourists to each and every part of the world, and make intra-continental and around-the-world tours options for the masses. As wheels roll amid historical development, the profile of the world has become clear over time.

The word “travel” originates from the French word “travail” (the name of an old tool for cruel torture), which has the extended meaning of pain or torture. Most of the early travellers had to walk unpaved roads for a few weeks amid uninterrupted threats from illness, hunger, wildlife and robbers.

The earliest philosophers in the East and West disseminated knowledge in journeys teeming with hardship and danger. By walking unknown roads, generations of successors recorded what they saw and heard amid pilgrimages, trading, explorations or novelty hunting. Their diaries, manuscripts, letters, memoirs and real objects enabled insights into what the world was like, how travels silently affected the production and life of all human beings, and changed ordinary people’s mentality. Through synthesis, these remains shaped later generations’ knowledge about the world.

Victorian Tours

In the Victorian era, the UK led the world’s first real upsurge of tours. At that time, tour trends were set by British nobles. These trend-setters who had high requirements for catering, accommodation, scenic spots and means of travel developed travel etiquettes that reflected their behavioral habits. As pioneers, they traveled different parts of the world, from the continent of Europe to the UK’s colonies like Egypt, Australia and North America. By defining routes to follow, such pioneering practices had a far-reaching influence on the middle class and ordinary people.

Today, while we have access to lighter, faster and easier means of travel, we miss the special tour styles prevailing among Victorian travellers - they might enjoy time on Orient Express, have fun on the luxurious White Star Line, or go deep into Egypt to visit pyramids…

From “the Rich First” to “Travellers First”

While the travel featured a hierarchy at the very beginning, “travellers’ freedom and rights” became the focus of tourist service as the tourist industry took shape. Since 1841, hotels, scenic spots, restaurants, train compartments, ship compartments and other tourism-related public spaces have witnessed the nearly 200 years of tourism’s fight against social unfairness. The long-lasting fight involves pushing the boundaries of race, class and gender and addressing other social or human rights-related issues. Tourist service providers, travellers and all sectors of society have all made major contributions to the effort. This is what has shaped the world of tourism where “members of all classes travel to bring together all wealth, statuses, characters, habits, social customs and dressing styles available in different countries”. Learn more:

Gladstone Act

As stipulated in the UK’s Gladstone Act (1844), third- and fourth-class train compartments must also be capped; every business day must see at least one train specially driven for third-class passengers; third-class train compartments must also be provided with lights; a train should not miss any stop, and; every week, there must be at least one train offering ticket prices acceptable to ordinary people. These provisions provide ordinary people with access to one-day seaside tours and low-priced tours.

Civil Rights Act

As stipulated in the Civil Rights Act (1866) of the US, to the extent permitted by law, everyone within the jurisdiction of the US, irrespective of his race, skin color and previous status of being enslaved or not, is entitled to sufficient, fair access to the accommodations, preferences, facilities and privileges a hotel provides, public means of transportation onshore and offshore, theatres and other public spaces of entertainment. The subsequent amendment to the Civil Rights Act ensures African Americans have equal access to hotels and public means of transportation.

Thomas Cook: A Pioneer

Popular tourist destinations remained a preserve of the rich in the 19th century. Aspiring to change that, Thomas Cook organized discount-featured tour groups to attract the masses. The affordable excursions Cook organized pointed to hot tourist destinations, such as British rural areas, Rhine Valley, French Riviera, Egyptian pyramids and the Swiss part of the Alps. This was how he provided more opportunities of going sightseeing for numerous salaried persons and middle-class members. At the beginning when the “monopoly” was broken, rich tourists complained the innovator’s travel agency, arguing that their proprietary “paradise” was invaded by uncivilized, uneducated people. Yet, at the travel agency, Cook and his team still followed the philosophy of “delivering high-quality service to all tourists”.

Driven by Education: The Grand Tour

From the early 17th century to the late 18th century, a multitude of tourists, the majority of whom were British noblemen, flocked into the continent of Europe to learn the classic culture of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. In the special upsurge of tours, “In the UK, instead of going to college, young men were sent abroad immediately when they graduated from middle schools. Amid the increasingly strong tendency, it is believed that traveling abroad enables significant improvements in young men’s knowledge and ability”, according to a book written by Adam Smith. This revealed that such tours in pursuit of classic culture went popular.

At the beginning of this upsurge, the tourists headed for well-known, time-honored cities like Paris, Rome and Venice. As a result, multiple study tour routes took shape later. Of them, the most popular one was from France to Italy, to Germany and Low Countries. The tourists spent about 2-4 years traveling around by carriage. In such expensive, long-time tours aiming to learn architectural, linguistic and cultural knowledge, they might stay in places of their interests for a few months or even several years.

For example, Russian emperor Peter the Great spent much time in the Netherlands during his tour in Western Europe. In the course of that, he witnessed architecture in Dutch cities like Armstrong. It is those architectures that inspired how he guided the building of St. Petersburg.

Popularity of the MICE Tourism: The World Expo

The World Expo is the oldest one of the global top 3 international events: the World Expo, the World Cup, and the Olympic Games. As a step to stimulate economic development and production, Napoleon held the earliest global expo, Craft Fair, in 1789. Following the well-recognized event, many countries often held large-scale expos to celebrate commemorative events, in ways that helped attract visitors worldwide. In this context, the MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences, exhibitions) tourism took the lead to spread tourist activities worldwide.

With the MICE tourism sweeping the world, MICE brands represented by “expo” have made significant contributions to global tourism. Since its first session taking place in 1851, the World Expo has welcomed over 1 billion visitors totally. For example, the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, held in London in 1851, attracted about 6.04 million people; the World Expo Osaka (1970) gave a cordial reception to 65 million visitors, and; the World Expo Shanghai (2010) was attended by more than 73 million participants.

Rise of Budget Travel: Backpacking

From nomadic tribes and ancient explorers, to backpackers and hippies, freewheeling tours have a long, long history.

Hiking and camping have been increasingly popular after the World War II. To facilitate long trips, some travellers improved the backpacks often used in marches of troops, and put bed sheets, sleeping bags, lighting tools and cooking utensils into improved backpacks. This could explain why these travellers are called “backpackers”. The nature of budget travel, coupled with the interestingness of exploration, makes backpacking much-admired among youths.

Contrary to large-scale commercialization of tours, backpacking has opened a new door for hippies, enabled tourist guidebooks to go global, and made outdoor recreational tours a fashion. Its popularity mirrors individuals’ varied tourist demands in post-modern society. Learn more: Vogue of Hippie Trails

Hippie travellers emerged in the 1960s and 1970s. These special travellers wore long hair and beard, and walked deserted trails without caring what they ate or where they lived. In fact, they established many tour routes.

At that time, the story that Marco Polo travelled the Silk Road aroused young people’s motivation to explore the mysterious Orient. The motivation was furthered by The Beatles’ travel to India in 1968. Following the example of the Hippie pioneer, hundreds of thousands of long-haired youths hiked from Europe to India. They set out in London or Amsterdam, went eastwards to Turkey by getting a lift or by train, and then passed through Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan by bus or through car sharing. The routes shaped on that basis were called “hippie trails”, or jokingly dubbed “Southeast Asia’s Banana Pancake Trails”. However, the wars in Lebanon and Afghanistan and the 1979 Iranian Revolution made most hippie trails too dangerous to pass through. As such, hippie trails saw decreasing travellers, and finally fell into oblivion.

Learn more: Birth of Bibles of Tourism - Lonely Planet

Tourist guidebooks came out in Egypt early in the 9th century. George Bradshaw’s Continental Railway Guide was often carried by travellers, according to the famous fiction Around the World in 80 Days. As a follow-up on that, South America Trekking Manual, a series of books on DIY tours in South America, appeared in 1921. In its true sense, the wave of tourist guidebooks emerged in 1960s and 1970s, marked by the birth of the journal Lonely Planet. In 1973, Lonely Planet published the first guide designed for young backpackers, Across Asia on the Cheap. Later, governments, tourist organizations and tourist service providers reached out to people about tourism also in the form of guides.

Learn more: Building of Hiking Trails

In early years, hikers simply walked on land or along traditional routes. As urbanization aroused a wave of outdoor recreation, urban residents in the West attempted to escape into forests. Driven by this tour mode, hiking trails were specially built worldwide. For example, Vermont's Long Trail, the US’ first long-distance trail, was completed in 1930; National Blue Trail, Europe’s first long-distance trail, was completed in Hungary in 1938.

In ancient China, tours were a preserve of the minority. At that time, tourists suffered from hard conditions of food, accommodation and transportation, and tours were money- and time-consuming. As such, monks, pilgrims, scholar-officials, emperors and merchants accounted for the majority of the tourist groups in ancient China, traveling for pilgrimages, pleasure, adventures or trading. It is their efforts that enabled the far-reaching ancient Silk Road, Maritime Silk Road, Road of Tang Poetry, Ten-thousand-li Tea Route and Tea-Horse Road to take shape.

Tour enthusiasts emerged in an endless stream across different dynasties in China. Today, we are lucky enough to get a glimpse of what tours were like in ancient China through their works recording what they saw and thought. As revealed by these works, Li Bai, a great poet of the Tang Dynasty, bade farewell to his family to “travel around the country by carrying a sword”; Xu Xiake, a famous traveller of the Ming Dynasty, toured mountains to “reach where ancestors had not reached, and discover what ancestors had not discovered”. In a word, generations of travellers in ancient times described what tours were like in their works.

The Republic of China (ROC) era saw tours turn into tourism. In particular, in ROC’s golden decade (1927-1937), tourism got on the fast track amid the growth of the national economy, especially in Beijing, Guangdong and the 5 southeast provinces. Yet, a drastic drop occurred in tourism as a result of the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, which led to a suspension of the sector.

In the ROC era, while tourism was a flash in the pan, it gradually drew near “poetry and the far afield”. For example, China Travel Service (CTS) lifted up the banner of “strengthening tourism with patriotism” in alignment with the philosophy of “keep running even without profit”; Yousheng Tour Group (YTG) operated with the slogan of “snatching leisure through tours”; Xin’an Tour Group (XTG) and Hunan-Guizhou-Yunnan Tour Group drifted from place to place in face of chaos during the Anti-Japanese War. That era made a special footnote of China’s tourist industry, laying a foundation for today’s tourism.

China’s First Travel Agency - CTS

In early years of the ROC era, only overseas travel agencies like Travelex (a British company preceded by Thomas Cook & Son), Travel Unit of American Express and Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO) were engaged in travel service in China. They were committed to the commission sale of train and ship tickets, and to the issuing of traveller's checks, with rude staff and operational chaos. As a result, the emerging tourist market was disorderly.

As a step to break the monopoly, Chen Guangfu, a Chinese banker, established a travel department under Shanghai Commercial & Savings Bank, Ltd. in 1923, marking the birth of the first Chinese travel agency (renamed China Travel Service in 1927). By the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, CTS had established 56 branches and offices, including those in Singapore and India. This made it a flagship of China’s early modern tourism. By providing us with plentiful historical information, the stories of Chen Guangfu and CTS enabled us to gain insights into the landscape of tours in China in the early modern times.

A Tour Pal Club - YTG

Yousheng Tour Group (YTG), a non-governmental travel organization founded by young tour enthusiasts, was only open to its members. The group, which comprised “old middle class” represented by owners of shops, restaurants and other small enterprises, and “emerging middle class” represented by executives and technicians of large enterprises, actively advocated tourist activities. Its business spanned 4 decades from its founding in 1915 to its enclosure soon after the founding of the P.R.C., writing a brilliant chapter in China’s early modern tourism.

YTG enjoyed increasing popularity amid its growth from a five-member organization to a large body with over 5,000 members. The group established entertaining clubs committed to interesting tour programs, such as Kunshan Hiking Competition, Mogan Mountain Mountaineering Competition and Nanxiang Horse Riding Competition. It organized leisure travel associations so as to all kinds of long and short trips all year round were initiated. Alongside the tour routes towards Minhang, Sheshan, Chongming and other suburbs of Shanghai, TYG established branches in Huzhou, Hankou, Hangzhou and Zhenjiang, and organized regular (weekly in most times) tours and irregular overseas tours. In so doing, the organization pioneered group tours and standardized this form of tour, writing a vivid chapter of tourism in the ROC era.

Marches amid Flames of War - XTG

National salvation movements swept China after the outbreak of the September 18th Incident. For example, in Huai’an Jiangsu, Wang Dazhi, the principal of Xin’an Primary School, called on children and juveniles to get involved in national salvation. As part of the effort, Wang led pupils to organize Xin’an Tour Group (XTG) to head for Shanghai and Zhenjiang for a 54-day study tour, in 1935. In the course of the tour, the members of the group became highly aware of how important the anti-Japanese outreach campaign was. As such, they further headed southwards to call on people to get involved in national salvation, in various forms. In the process that its members rose from 14 to more than 100, XTG left footprints in 22 provinces across the country. This study tour group set up for national salvation led the then generation of children and juveniles to fulfill the responsibility of defending the country, completing a special, meaningful tour.

From 1939 onwards, the story of XTG spread to the Soviet Union, India, Singapore, the US, Canada and France, exerting an extensive influence at home and abroad.