Dragon Boat Festival meets midsummer—it's the perfect time for cultural tourism. During the 2026 Dragon Boat Festival holiday, Lanzhou will leverage its unique Yellow River landscape resources and profound Silk Road folk traditions to coordinate urban waterfront landscapes, landmark cultural venues, suburban ecological attractions, newly established cultural tourism complexes, and specialty commercial streets to launch a series of themed cultural activities. The waterwheel expo park has returned to traditional Chinese customs, the Yellow River Tower immersive experience has gone viral, the ink wash Danxia scenic area has gained popularity, and the Shiguangli art ecological resort corridor has been newly launched. Lanzhou Old Street and Wanda Mall, two major commercial cultural tourism carriers, have simultaneously launched Dragon Boat Festival intangible cultural heritage events. The city's cultural tourism market is rich, orderly, and vibrant. The coordinated development of all-region tourism has achieved remarkable results. Urban micro-vacations, suburban leisure tours, cultural experience tours, and business district leisure tours have become the mainstream of holiday consumption.
"Shiguangli" for traffic generation
A new landmark for micro-vacations near Lanzhou is gaining popularity
During the Dragon Boat Festival holiday, the Shiguangli Art Ecological Resort Corridor, located on the north side of Shifogou National Forest Park, officially opened. As a front-line supporting complex adjacent to the scenic area entrance, it not only meets tourists' dining and leisure consumption needs but also enriches the overall regional travel experience through open streets and immersive performances. While significantly boosting the overall cultural tourism popularity of high-end midday holidays, it also injects new momentum into the high-quality development of Lanzhou's suburban cultural tourism industry, filling the gap in high-quality suburban micro-vacation formats in the city.
The project is jointly developed by Gansu Cultural Tourism Group and the Qilihe District Government, featuring outstanding location advantages and superior ecological resources. It is 16 kilometers from the main urban area and just a 15-minute drive away. The project covers a total area of 141.3 mu, with a building area of over 60,000 square meters. Adhering to the concepts of ecological priority and integration of culture and tourism, it is planned with a spatial layout of "one core, two belts, and eight zones," integrating ecological sightseeing, cultural experiences, leisure and commerce, wellness and travel, family recreation, and conference study tours, fully covering cultural and tourism consumption needs of all age groups.
Since its official opening, traffic has flowed continuously inside and outside the park, with all major formats fully open and crowded to the public. The Silk Road style street has neatly arranged shops, gathering local specialty foods and trendy commercial formats, full of lively atmosphere. Supporting indoor immersive competition projects attract many young people to experience together, unlocking new urban leisure scenes; The Intangible Cultural Heritage Cultural and Creative Zone deeply cultivates Longyuan's local culture, with display cases displaying carved gourds, paper-cutting, clay sculptures, and other intangible cultural heritage handicrafts and original cultural and creative products. Intangible cultural heritage artisans are invited to create on site, while a platform for university students' cultural and creative entrepreneurship is also established to support the inheritance and innovation of local culture; Shiguang Theater has a spacious space suitable for high-end conferences, cultural performances, team-building and study tours, offering comprehensive functions and diverse business formats; The grassland leisure area under the forest is lush with vegetation, creating a mountain and wilderness light vacation base, offering outdoor experience programs such as pet-friendly interaction and non-powered expansion, where parents can run and play with their children, making it the preferred destination for parent-child leisure.
"In the past, coming to Shifogou was just a simple hiking and photography, and it would be done in half a day. This year, the newly opened Shiguangli project offers a wide variety of content and a particularly good experience. Mr. Wang, a local resident, said that a trip to Shifogou Scenic Area now allows you to escape the summer heat and hike, enjoy coffee and enjoy the mountain views, feed squirrels with your child, make Dragon Boat Festival crafts, and enjoy fun interactions. The content is rich and the activities diverse, allowing the whole family to immerse themselves for a whole day. It's an excellent choice for short trips to the suburbs.
An immersive experience
Inheriting the Yellow River agricultural folk cultural heritage
During the Dragon Boat Festival, Lanzhou Waterwheel Expo Park delves deeply into the Yellow River waterwheel farming culture and traditional folk customs, launching immersive Chinese-style park activities that allow citizens and tourists to experience the charm of traditional culture up close through traditional games, farming experiences, and folk interactions.
The scenic area offers free access to the traditional Chinese style interactive experience area. Traditional folk games such as pitch-pot and cuju are very popular, with families and children actively participating, experiencing traditional etiquette and ancient leisure culture through fun interactions. Many parents gathered around the play area with their children, explaining the origins of traditional games hand-in-hand. The children played pitch-pot with arrows, their laughter and joy echoing along the riverside trail.
At the same time, the park offers hands-on and foot-operated antique dragon bone waterwheel experiences, allowing visitors to operate traditional irrigation facilities by hand. The wheels slowly rotate with human effort, and clear water flows gently along the ditches, allowing visitors to directly experience the ancient farming techniques of the Yellow River basin and immerse themselves in Lanzhou's millennia-old water conservancy and farming culture. The quaint waterwheel wheels turn endlessly, the riverside scenery is fresh and elegant, willows hang along the banks and gentle breezes brush the face, and traditional folk customs are full of fun. The Waterwheel Expo Park uses a realistic, experiential cultural tourism model to bring traditional festivals back to their cultural essence, effectively enriching citizens' holiday cultural life.
A grand national style feast unfolds
Light and shadow scenes bring a millennium of historical charm to life
As a cultural landmark of Lanzhou's Yellow River, during the Dragon Boat Festival holiday, Huanghe Tower launched full-day regular Chinese-themed activities. Daytime blessing tours and Hanfu parades create a strong atmosphere, while nighttime light and shadow shows are spectacular, creating a high-quality immersive cultural tourism experience through day-night collaboration.
During the festival, the South Square of Huanghe Tower hosts daily choral performances, with lively singing paying tribute to Yellow River culture and praising the beauty of Lanzhou. Many visitors stop to sing along, taking out their phones to capture touching scenes. The visitor center regularly offers Dragon Boat Festival blessing services such as cinnabar mole placement and red string wishes. Staff hold cinnabar and gently tap the children's foreheads to offer safe and smooth holiday wishes. Children of appropriate age can receive colorful Dragon Boat Festival flower strings for free, adding a strong sense of ceremony. During the event, the scenic area also hosts a large-scale Hanfu parade. Hanfu enthusiasts stroll leisurely through the park, with flowing robes, ruqun, and long robes strolling through the corridors, complementing the flying eaves and carved beams of ancient buildings, painting an elegant and beautiful traditional Chinese style painting that attracts many visitors to follow and take photos along the way.
As night falls and the city lights come on, the live light and shadow show "Ode to the Yellow River: Great Lanzhou" is staged on time. Light and shadow technology is deeply integrated with ancient architecture, focusing on Yellow River civilization, Silk Road changes, and urban development, vividly recreating Lanzhou's millennia-old historical evolution and achievements in the era through chapters. Brilliant lights and shadows fill the entire building, and the grand and melodious audiovisual effects strike the heart. The riverside viewing area is packed, with visitors holding their breath and frequently exclaiming in admiration, bringing visitors a stunning nighttime cultural tourism experience and continuously enhancing the Yellow River Tower landmark brand influence.
Danxia went viral and went viral
Suburban ecotourism has improved quality and efficiency
With the support of the Dragon Boat Festival and Summer Solstice, tourism enthusiasm at Lanzhou Ink Danxia Scenic Area continues to rise. The number of visitors during the holiday increased by 15% year-on-year, operating revenue increased by 20% year-on-year, and the holiday market concluded successfully, smoothly transitioning into the peak summer tourism season.
During the festival, the scenic area launched a series of interactive activities in conjunction with Dragon Boat Festival folk customs. At the entrance, staff continuously distributed five-colored blessing ropes for free. Visitors tied them to their wrists and walked through the reddish-brown Danxia landforms, creating a unique scenic line. The viewing platform features zongzi-making competitions and fun prize sets. Visitors sit around rolling up zongzi leaves, stuffing glutinous rice, and tying cotton string to see who can wrap tight and beautiful zongzi. Cheers fill the venue, and a strong festive atmosphere permeates the mountains and fields.
The exclusively developed "Danxia Little Detective" parent-child study tour project is highly favored. Study guides lead young people along the Danxia Trail, explain geological rock layer knowledge, and through immersive geological science popularization and mountain exploration experiences, help youth learn knowledge and broaden their horizons while getting close to nature. Regular live performances of "Danxia Dancing Horses" and folk welcome dances were spectacularly staged. Actors dressed in Silk Road nomadic costumes performed singing and dancing on the unique Danxia landform on the live set, showcasing the nomadic customs of the Silk Road and becoming highlights of the scenic area's cultural tourism features.
A folk opera was performed
Night tours in the neighborhood are on the rise
Lanzhou Old Street is themed "Zongtou Opera · Intangible Cultural Heritage Charm," creating full-time distinctive cultural tourism activities, deeply integrating traditional folk customs, intangible heritage performances, handmade experiences, and commercial consumption. The entire street is adorned with Dragon Boat Festival mugwort and colorful sachets, and ancient-style lanterns line the streets, creating a festive atmosphere. On June 19, the series of events fully kicked off, with street-facing opera stages performing local intangible cultural heritage plays such as Qin Opera and Nuo Dance in succession. The audience below sat and paused, veteran opera fans softly joined in along with the singing, and many young tourists held their phones to record the entire event, immersing themselves in the charm of traditional opera.
The intangible cultural heritage handmade experience area was bustling, with artisans demonstrating traditional skills such as wood carving, sachet sewing, and paper-cutting. Visitors could personally make Dragon Boat Festival sachets and colorful strings, and the crafts they completed could be taken home for keeping. Gift distribution points are set up along the district's water system, allowing visitors to receive small Dragon Boat Festival gifts in an orderly manner, and the riverside walkways are bustling with people. After dusk, the old street's lights light up one after another, river boats glide slowly, folk performances continue to intensify, and the lively scene lasts late into the night, revitalizing the neighborhood's nighttime economy with a strong folk atmosphere, making it a popular check-in spot during the Dragon Boat Festival holiday in the urban area.
Lanzhou Wanda Mall dual-themed carnival
Unlock new urban leisure scenes
Lanzhou Wanda Mall seized the dual milestones of Dragon Boat Festival and graduation season, launching a dual-themed series of activities for visitors of all ages. The venue offers rich activities both inside and outside the venue, with abundant benefits, attracting large numbers of families, graduates, and students to come and enjoy the trip. The park's Water World simultaneously launched summer operations, with cool water play programs highly favored. Online early bird tickets at 54% off were launched, sparking a buying frenzy as soon as sales began.
Here, an outdoor Dragon Boat Festival intangible heritage show has been held, featuring folk performances such as Qinqiang fire-blowing, face-changing, and stilt walking, with thrilling and exciting performances drawing cheers from the crowd; In the evening, the graduation music festival kicks off, with trendy bands performing on stage and graduates stopping together to listen, creating a lively atmosphere. Indoor shopping malls simultaneously host fun sneaky food competitions and graduation-themed exhibitions, with students actively participating in check-in interactions. Throughout the venue, families traveling together and graduates taking photos can be seen everywhere. The amusement area, shops, and performance plazas are bustling with people, creating a one-stop urban leisure destination through a fusion model of "intangible cultural heritage performances + water play + public promotions."
During this Dragon Boat Festival holiday, Lanzhou coordinated four major sectors: city landmarks, suburban scenic spots, newly built cultural tourism projects, and characteristic business districts and streets. The city featured a rich variety of folk activities, a diverse and high-quality product supply, and precise service guarantees.
From the farming traditional Chinese style amusement park at the Waterwheel Expo Park to the day-night Chinese light and shadow feast at Yellow River Tower; From ecological study tours and folk interactions in the Danxia Mountains with ink wash painting, to the newly opened Shiguangli Art Ecological Corridor mountain micro-vacation experience; Then, with the two major commercial platforms Lanzhou Old Street and Wanda Mall, launching intangible cultural heritage themes and dual-festival special events, Jincheng Lanzhou's cultural tourism market flourishes in multiple points and is full of highlights.
A representative from the Lanzhou Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism stated: "Currently, the city's cultural tourism industry is guided by public demand and centers on building large-scale scenic areas across the region. We continuously enrich holiday cultural tourism offerings, keep polishing the 'Beautiful Banks by the Yellow River' brand, and strive to accumulate strong momentum for the high-quality development of the city's cultural tourism and wellness industry." (Chief Reporter Li Chao, Trainee Reporter Zhang Jing)