Over 200 events will take place in China and Russia this year, in a bid to increase tourism between the world’s fastest-growing country and its neighbor.

The 2012 Sino-Russia Tourism Year is designed to boost interest in both countries among their respective populations, with Russia keen to capture a share of the booming outbound Chinese market, already up 52 percent in the first nine months of 2011.

China, for its part, is in turn keen to ensure that it maintains its lofty position as the destination most visited by Russian tourists — nearly 2.54 million Russians traveled to China in 2011, up seven percent, according to China’s tourism authority.

This year, cities around China will hold exhibitions, film festivals, culinary events and fashion shows designed to highlight the joys of Russia, before Russia returns the favor in 2013.

As part of the first year, Chinese singer Li Jiang and actor Lu Yi will both head to Russia on vacation, returning to tell their countrymen about their experiences, reports suggest.

As with other visitors to Russia, the most popular destinations for Chinese visitors are Moscow and St Petersburg, where luxury shops, glitzy casinos and a buzzing nightlife attract wealthy visitors.

However, Russian destinations from other regions, particularly those on the southern borders, are keen to attract visitors too such as Altai Krai, a participant at the recent Russian tourism expo in Moscow.

In China, the destinations visited by Russians are more diverse, but one thing is for sure — the state-sponsored development of Hainan as a tax-free vacation haven has had a big impact.

Some sources estimate that Hainan, which saw 800,000 visitors in 2011, could be China’s most popular destination for the Russians, who can now a reported 30 flights to arrive from second and third tier cities.

Shanghai resident Du Chengyi and his family of three have had to spend six extra days in Antalya, Turkey, to appear in court on charges of smuggling cultural relics during their trip.

The 20 euro ($27) stone Du bought from a vendor at a scenic site was to blame.

“It (the stone) looks like any piece of normal marble, with both sides ground to rectangles,” Du said about the brick-sized stone he brought as a souvenir during the vacation with his wife and mother-in-law.

“We never asked for a receipt during our nine-day stay in Turkey because of the difficulty with the language, and we were never told that tourists could not bring the stone out of the country,” said Du, who arrived in Shanghai on Wednesday afternoon with his family.

Since March 22, Du and his family have spent a day in Antalya’s police bureau and have been dealing with the court. They said they learned at Antalya International Airport last Thursday that the “souvenir” they bought was a piece from a cultural relic, and they were arrested on smuggling charges because they could not produce a receipt.

Du said he hired a local attorney to handle the case and that he was informed the next court date would be on April 10. “I’m not sure how much I could be fined, but a French woman was just deported and charged 15,000 euros for a piece of stone she picked up at the seaside a few days ago.”

Du blamed Turkish authorities for his situation because they didn’t take any initiative to inform foreign tourists of the law.

GoTurkey.com, however, Turkey’s official tourism portal, warns that exporting antiquities or antiques from the country is a serious crime and there are severe penalties for those who attempt to do so.

In addition to the warning, the website also mentions that “for valuable gifts and souvenirs, proof of purchase is necessary, together with receipts showing that any currency used in the purchase has been legally exchanged”.

According to Liu Yang, a Beijing lawyer who specializes in relics preservation, Turkey had more than 5,000 cases involving smuggling of cultural relics in 2010 alone. “The legal system related to smuggling of Turkey’s cultural relics is very strict,” Liu said.

As for Du’s case, he said that if the matter could not be resolved through diplomatic channels, the only option is to prove that the family was unaware of the law. “A large amount of evidence and a witness, such as the vendor who sold the stone, must be tracked down in Turkey to prove Du didn’t know,” he said.

Shen Jie, of Shanghai’s SAL travel agency, said most tour groups would be informed of the potential consequences of not asking for a receipt for purchases in countries such as Egypt and Turkey. “They’d be advised to shop at formal stores rather than street venders,” said Shen, who’s in charge of the agency’s Turkey tourism. “Du headed to Turkey as an individual traveler rather than group traveler.”

Zhou Yan, who works as a translator for a German court, said that although this was the first case in Turkey in which Chinese were involved, such cases are common among European tourists visiting Antalya.

“German travelers are the main source of Antalya’s tourism revenue, so the German embassy is very familiar with the process of rescuing its nationals from the city, and German travel agencies always warn their tourists before their departure,” said Zhou, who regularly vacations in Antalya. “The only reason it took so long for this to happen to a Chinese is that not many Chinese visit Antalya.”

Zhou also said that from the experience of European countries’ foreign ministries in dealing with this kind of case in Turkey, there is no way to prove whether a piece of stone is a cultural relic because “by law, the (Turkish) people determine whether an object is a relic or not”.

In the meantime, the Shanghai Tourism Bureau reminded Chinese tourists on Tuesday to be aware of foreign laws and customs before heading overseas.

By DAVID A. ANDELMAN

SIME/eStock Photo

ON TRACK | Ganden monastery in Mongolia

THE TRANS-MONGOLIAN Railway leaves in the dead of night.

It departs from an ornate station in Irkutsk, Russia, where wooden houses built by exiled 19th-century intellectuals mingle with blocky Soviet-era buildings. It winds past Russia’s vast Lake Baikal, traverses the Mongolian grasslands that Genghis Khan rode his horsemen across on the way to Europe and rattles through the Gobi Desert into China, pulling into Beijing 1,820 miles later.

It is one of the most storied train rides in the world, a journey through raw landscapes and historic realms. For decades, I’d longed to experience it for myself.

Markel Redondo

A train chugging through the Asian steppes

I first fell under the spell of Genghis and his Mongol horde—a rapid-strike force of mounted warriors who invaded civilizations as far apart as Baghdad and Budapest—more than half a century ago, when I studied with Francis Cleaves, the renowned translator of “The Secret History of the Mongols.” Into the 1980s, my dream of visiting was all but impossible, with Khan’s land run by one of communism’s most brutal Stalinist dictatorships. But last year, with Mongolia moving toward a full democracy, the time finally seemed right for a rail trip with my wife through parts of Russia, Mongolia and China.

I knew the five-week expedition, involving multiple legs, odd stops and extended side trips, would be a test of our travel mettle. So, it turned out, was the planning—few travel agents could make arrangements across three countries with different languages, cultures and bureaucracies. All told, it took five months to arrange our visas, guides, hotels and transportation.

We had decided to embark in Irkutsk, where the also-famous Trans-Siberian Railroad stops en route from Moscow to Vladivostok, connecting to the Trans-Mongolian that runs south toward Ulaanbaatar. At 10 p.m., we appeared at the bustling station. As our guide checked the track, we dodged the locals pushing through the doors, laden with all manner of bundles and packages.

“Irkutsk-Pekin” was stenciled on the side of our train in Cyrillic letters, but otherwise it was unromantic-looking. The inside, even in first class, was clean but not much more inspiring. Our compartment had a window, a fold-down table and simple berths for four. At each end of the car was a tiny metal room with a toilet that flushed waste through a trap door.

“We’d been warned that train passengers could easily find themselves the victims of brigands. ”

Our guide glanced around our spartan quarters and pronounced us “safe” before taking off. What that meant wasn’t quite clear—we’d been warned that passengers could easily become victims of brigands, their luggage, cameras, wallets pilfered as they slept or took breaks on platforms. But more pleasant company soon appeared. A conductor (they are invariably women) clad in a blue skirt, white shirt and apron poked her head into our compartment and asked if we’d like some tea. Darting down the corridor to a wood-fired samovar tucked in a cupboard, she reappeared moments later carrying glasses in filigreed silver holders and tea bags of Siberian milk tea, thick, fragrant and soothing.

We claimed the two lower bunks just before a third passenger arrived—a rotund Mongolian lady carrying bulging shopping bags. She plopped them on the top bunk and sat next to us, smiling but clearly unhappy. A few minutes later, she disappeared, then returned for her bags. She’d negotiated a bottom bunk next door. Helping her with her purchases, I discovered they consisted of large watermelons she’d bought in Siberia and was planning to sell for a handsome profit in Mongolia’s capital, where fruit is scarce and expensive.

Precisely on time, the train gave a shiver and started moving into the countryside, chugging around the southern end of Lake Baikal. In June we’d have been treated to spectacular views of the world’s deepest lake, but it was September and the sun had set 90 minutes earlier. Gazing out at the darkness, we nibbled at the food we’d brought—granola and packaged cheese from home; sausage, black bread, chocolate and shelf-stable milk from Irkutsk. Lulled by the rocking, we fell asleep in our bunks, though not before wedging a backpack against the door.

Redchopsticks/Getty Images

A temple in Inner Mongolia, China

Dawn broke as we hit the border. At Naushki, on the Russian side, a guard with a German shepherd briskly announced himself at our compartment. We briefly panicked that the canine might take a shine to our sausage, but the guard curtly checked our papers and left. Just across the barbed-wire border in Sükhbaatar, friendlier Mongolian guards glanced at our passports. Mongolia is a nation trapped between superpowers—as one shepherd told us, “We may hate the Russians, but we fear the Chinese.” It’s no longer either nation’s poor cousin, thanks to its vast mineral resources, though you might not know it from a landscape that was so empty, it seemed Genghis could gallop past at any moment.

Riding the Trans-Mongolian felt like being on a milk train. It clicked and swayed along on tracks that have seen better days, making frequent stops that allowed us to quickly explore tiny depots in towns surrounded by wide grasslands.

After two more nights, the Trans-Mongolian pulled into the capital of Ulaanbaatar and we set off for three weeks of exploring—to the nearby Ganden Buddhist monastery, northeast to Hinti province for fly fishing, south to the Gobi Desert. We bounced over the steppes, sleeping in gers that were warmed only by a stove and stood a half-mile from the nearest outhouse. We awoke to stunning sunrises over flat, hardscrabble earth. The simple lives of the nomads—many possess a few pots, some basic clothes, a tiny, solar-powered TV set and sheep—reminded us just how few belongings people really need.

Early one evening we re-boarded the Trans-Mongolian in Ulaanbaatar’s dim central station (the lights go on after night truly sets in, to save electricity). On this leg, the train didn’t boast austere Russian fittings but a seedy, old-word décor—wood-paneled walls, fringed table covering, an Oriental carpet.

We entered the 500,000-square-mile Gobi Desert around dawn. Except for a few 20-story-high dunes on the far western fringe, it’s a flat wasteland of scrub brush and sandy soil, and on the Mongolian side there is little to see. But when we passed into China’s Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region, brand-new towns began to fill the landscape. Wind farms whirring with hundreds of turbines. And, despite the ostensibly friendly relations with Mongolia, on sidings were flatbed trains loaded with tanks pointing north toward the border.

THE LOWDOWN: MONGOLIA

Planning It: If you just want to take the train from Irkutsk to Beijing, with a break in Ulaanbaatar, book the first leg in advance (about $300, russiantrains.com) and the remainder of the train trip once you reach the Mongolian capital. If you are venturing beyond Ulaanbaatar, a local travel consultant is essential. We used upscale Nomadic Expeditions (nomadicexpeditions.com). Tseren Tours (tserentours.com) is one of many lower-priced options. China and Russia require visas for American visitors; allow at least a month for processing.

Getting There: To follow the entire Trans-Mongolian route, you can begin in Beijing or Irkutsk. Beijing receives flights from around the world; for Irkutsk, fly from Moscow. Aeroflot has spanking new Airbus and Boeing jets and surprisingly warm service.

Staying There: The new, locally owned Ramada Ulaanbaatar Citycenter hosted Vice President Joe Biden’s advance team last year. It is centrally located and has full Mongolian and Western menus (from $180 per night, ramada.com). Book a car and English-speaking driver through the concierge.

What to Bring: Temperatures can vary dramatically, especially in the Gobi Desert, so pack layers to wear. Mini-flashlights are indispensable. There are few porters, so be prepared to carry whatever you bring.

Before we could go much further, our train had to undergo a process known as “changing the bogeys.” The distance between the rails changes between Mongolia and China. So at the border, each car is lifted off the Mongolian bogeys and Chinese ones are slid into place. The process gave us about an hour to explore the Chinese border town—a single street lined with stall-like shops selling spices, rice and clothing. I had to restrain my wife from adding a load of fragrant foodstuffs to our already backbreaking luggage. Then we got back on the train, heading south toward the Inner Mongolian capital of Hohhot.

We arrived in late evening, and drove through the brilliantly lit streets. Hohhot, the regional capital, has a large Muslim population, and our guide pointed out minarets, including a hulking structure that he said was a mosque under construction. The next day we learned that many buildings sporting minarets are department stores that authorities hope visitors will take for mosques. Somehow, it felt like being back in Russia under the kommissars—or for that matter, China under Mao—except that the mall at our hotel boasted Louis Vuitton, Ermenegildo Zegna and Bose boutiques.

We boarded the Trans-Mongolian for our final leg at Hohhot’s chaotic central station, where we were nearly engulfed in the masses of people. There were two mates in our compartment. One, a student, slept the entire ride. The other, a garrulous Chinese entrepreneur, regaled us with tales of his mine safety invention, his business and his lpans to emigrate to Vancouver.

We’d heard it was dangerous to leave our compartment for a moment, since you risk finding locals without first-class tickets in your place. But we encountered no thieves on our trip—only people who were friendly, generous and curious about us, invariably the only Americans around. In fact, the most thrilling part of our trip wasn’t the ride itself, but the kaleidoscope of humanity we encountered, from Scandinavian missionaries to students from Eastern Europe to watermelon vendors on their way to Ulaanbaatar.

We pushed through more densely populated areas, stopping at small towns during the 10-hour trip to the capital. In the early morning we passed canyons and rivers, craggy hills, even a glimpse of the Great Wall of China, designed to keep out the Mongols with whom we’d been consorting.

Finally we pulled into Beijing West Railway Station. As we disembarked, I breathed a sigh of relief and accomplishment. Then we humped our bags up a steep staircase, and into a maelstrom of taxis and people.

A top Senate Democrat wants to push through legislation by the summer that would update and streamline visa rules to boost international travel and bolster the U.S. economy.

While there is broad support for the bill, some lawmakers have raised concerns about security issues, including the ability of U.S. officials to keep tabs on foreign travelers who might over stay their visa.

California Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Tuesday that the U.S. needs to implement an exit system that can track travelers departure from the country before moving forward with a bill that would speed up the visa process, saying it would be “foolhardy” prior to that time.

“This makes no sense, we need to have exit system in place,” she said during a Senate Judiciary hearing on Tuesday.

“If another terrorist came in on a visa entry program without an exit program and stayed, I could never forgive myself,” she said.

Feinstein, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said she has been told by officials at the Department of Homeland Security that by June 2012, the agency will have a “fully operative biographic exit system in place for those who exit by U.S. airports.”

She said the department should be ready to calculate overstays by April or May.

“We will see, I’ve been told this before and before and before,” she said.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said that while the bill “looks pretty good” and he “favors most of it” the overstay problem is important and an exit system is needed.

The package, a combination of bills previously introduced, is designed bolster the economic recovery by reducing costs, speeding up visa times and easing restrictions for visitors interested in traveling to the United States.

Seven senators — Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) — unveiled the legislation on Monday arguing that it could add nearly $100 billion to the economy and create 700,000 jobs in the next decade.

The senators say that the legislation — the Jobs Originated through Launching Travel (“JOLT”) Act — to get the economy going into high gear.

In the past 10 years the United States market share of worldwide overseas travel market has dropped from a 17 percent to less than 12 percent — as global travel is expected to double over the next decade.

“This is a jobs bill, no question about it,” Schumer said at Tuesday’s hearing.

He said at a hearing that the differences were narrowing on the bill and he would like to “move it quickly in time for summer tourism season.

“Moving this is really a national imperative,” he said.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the U.S. Travel Association along with the National Retail Federation are among the business groups that support the measure.

Thomas Donohue, president and chief executive of U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said the bill is all about jobs.

“We are talking about a way in which we can strengthen our economy just by encouraging more travelers to visit the United States,” he said.

The USTA recently studied the economic effects of including 11 potential candidates for the visa waiver program — Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Chile, Croatia, Israel, Panama, Poland, Romania, Taiwan and Uruguay.  Last year, 3 million visitors from these countries spent $14 billion in the United States, directly supporting 104,300 jobs in the American travel industry.

In the first year of participation in the visa program, the growth would nearly double.  If that first year were 2012, travel would generate an additional 482,000 arrivals and $5.1 billion more in total revenue, USTA estimates.

Last year the travel industry supported 14.4 million American jobs and added $1.9 trillion to the U.S. economy.

“If there is one thing I can leave with you today it’s this, our industry has the potential to grow and to grow fast,” said Roger Dow, president and chief executive of USTA.

The National Retail Federation also urged the Senate to approve the measure.

“Foreign tourists and business people want to come to the United States and shop in our stores, but long lines for visas have them taking their money elsewhere,” NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay said.

“Retailers wouldn’t tell customers to wait for weeks and neither should the State Department,” he said.

“Speeding up the visa process is one of the quickest ways to boost the U.S. economy, and we should do it as soon as possible.”

International travel to the United States represents a significant component of the economy. Studies show that, on average, each overseas visitor spends about $4,000.

In 2011, international visitors spent a record $153 billion on U.S. travel and tourism-related goods and services, the Commerce Department reported last week.

The White House and State Department have added visa centers in countries like China and Brazil where demand for travel is the greatest.

Under current law, the wait time for U.S. visas can be as long as 100 days for travelers from certain countries.

In addition, the $140 visa application fee and travel to distant consulates for visa interviews has hampered travel to the United States.

The measure aims to encourage the State Department to issue Chinese visitor visas that last longer than the current one-year maximum and provide some Canadian “snowbird” visitors with visas to stay up to 240 days, up from 180.

Under current law, Chinese nationals must apply for new U.S. visas every year to travel to the United States, while travelers from other countries can receive up to 10-year, multiple entry visas.

Feinstein expressed concern that, at this point, there is little to no recourse for U.S. officials if a Chinese visitor over stays their visa. She said an agreement is needed between both nations to ensure that the over stays are kept to a minimum.

The bill requests that the State Department lower visa application fees during off-peak seasons to give travelers the incentive to apply for visas when demand is lower, with an increase in visa application volume expected to make up for lower application fees.

The measure would allow the State Department to charge a fee for expediting some tourist and business travel visas. Under the bill, State would issue a visa within three business days and with the fee increase capacity to more quickly process those visas in India, China, and Brazil.

The bill sets standards for visa processing — conducting interviews within 15 days of requesting an appointment and after one-year, lower the wait time to 10 days.

The legislation also would allow Customs and Border Protection to add foreign dignitaries to the global entry program on a “case-by-case” basis, establish tough standards for visa processing times.

Under the measure, Poland and other nations would be allowed to join the visa waiver program, a move generally backed by lawmakers, including Feinstein.

The Nevada Commission on Tourism and partners in the tourism industry will conduct a business trip to China in April designed to boost travel to Nevada, Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki announced today. Leading the trip will be Krolicki, who is chair of NCOT, accompanied by Tourism and Cultural Affairs Department Director Claudia Vecchio. Included in this trip will be a sales mission with Nevada business leaders looking to spur interest in and travel to the Silver State.

“China is a lucrative travel market demonstrated by the surge of Chinese visitors to the state of Nevada,” Krolicki said. “We have been working tirelessly for more than a decade with our tourism industry to foster relationships with key government officials, travel professionals and the media, and to create a dialogue around why Nevada should be the destination of choice for Chinese leisure and business travelers.”

Brand USA, the marketing arm for the U.S. Travel Association, has identified China as a high-priority market, stating that demand for travel visas has increased 124 percent since 2005. According to U.S. Travel http://www.ustravel.org , the number of visitors from Mainland China to the U.S. is expected to increase 219 percent by 2015.

“In January, a pilot program to simplify and speed up the visa process was established at the federal level, opening the doors to greater access than ever. Part of that plan is to increase visa processing capabilities in Brazil and China by 40 percent in 2012. If Nevada can attract 40 percent more travelers from China – who, according to U.S. Travel, spend more than $6,000 per person, per trip, the economic potential would be staggering,” Vecchio said. “That is why sales missions like this are so vital to our industry.”

NCOT’s sales mission will include an education seminar for Chinese tour operators on Nevada’s offerings; sales calls to travel agents and tour operators; meetings with airline managers and local tourism officials; and a briefing on other issues with senior U.S. officials in China. The group will travel to Beijing, Macau, Hong Kong and Shanghai.

In 2004, NCOT was the first U.S. tourism entity to be granted a license by the Chinese government to advertise travel in China. The license was the culmination of years of developing beneficial relationships with Chinese government and business officials, and periodic sales missions have served to reinforce those relationships and develop new contacts. NCOT also has signed “Friendship Agreements” with nine Chinese cities or provinces. The agreements are important symbols of cooperation between the destinations to promote travel between them.

In addition to efforts in China, the Nevada Commission on Tourism markets the state to international travelers in global markets including the U.K., Germany, France, Canada, Mexico, South Korea, Australia and Brazil. For more information on how the Nevada Commission on Tourism markets the state both domestically and internationally, please visit www.TravelNevada.com .