Wang Jin and her husband, frequent travelers to Western Europe, wanted to experience the other side of the continent for a change.
 

Last November, the Beijing natives visited Budapest in Hungary and Prague in the Czech Republic - "places that are not as mainstream as France and Italy, but have a similarly rich cultural heritage", said Wang, a public relations manager at an Italian sports product company in Beijing.

The seven-day vacation offered the couple many surprises.
 

In Hungary, they soaked in a 37C hot-spring pool in an ancient castle and tasted the best Hungarian cuisine at the Gundel restaurant. In Prague, both the opera Turandot at the national theater and the puppet show Don Juan impressed their Chinese audience.

Wang and her husband are part of a niche group of Chinese outbound travelers who have developed an interest in Eastern Europe after trips to Southeast Asia, Western Europe and the United States.
 

The number of Chinese visitors to Eastern Europe remains small compared with those to the other half of the continent, said Jiang Yiyi, director of the International Tourism Development Institute at China Tourism Academy.
 

A growing economy, an appreciating currency and more preferential policies from destination countries have created a robust Chinese outbound tourism market.
 

It grew 20.4 percent year-on-year to 57.39 million people times in 2010, according to the academy's 2011 China Outbound Tourism Development Report.
 

The report said outbound spending increased 14 percent to $48 billion, No 4 in the world in terms of total expenditure, and this growth is expected to continue this year.
 

Jiang said the number of Chinese visitors to Eastern Europe remained relatively small due to a lack of knowledge of the area and difficulties in obtaining visas.
 

In 2009, the number of European Union countries who accepted Approved Destination Status (ADS) visas from Chinese travel agencies or tour operators had dropped to 15.
 

The number of ADS visas issued in 2009 to Chinese people to visit the Czech Republic is about 2,000, about 1,000 to Hungary and about 200 to Poland, Jiang said, citing statistics from the European Union.
 

But in recent years, there has been a visible growth in the number of visitors to Eastern Europe, particularly among private independent travelers and business travelers, said Robert Vertes, tourism attach of the Hungarian embassy in China.
 

The number of travelers from China to Hungary is increasing, up around 15 percent year-on-year, said Vertes.
 

"When Chinese tourists want to go to Europe for the second time, it is very likely they will choose Eastern European countries," Vertes said.

Due to historical and political bonds between the two countries, Chinese people aged over 40 prefer to visit Hungary and the Czech Republic. But Vertes said it is the younger generation that Eastern European tourism authorities are eager to lure.
 

"We are trying to make our country more accessible to young people to expand the scope of our visitors from China," he said.