China meets the world, as 200m tourists bring destinations to maximum capacity

As cities like Rome reach maximum capacity, tourist caps and taxes are being mooted to deal with the projected influx. Photo / Olena Serditov, 123RF

If you went been to Venice, Barcelona or Paris last summer and you thought it felt very busy, you were not alone, writes Frank Barratt for the Mail on Sunday.

Venice and Barcelona were so overcrowded that locals took to the streets to protest at the growing tourist onslaught. And one of the main reasons for the crowds was... China.

The Chinese are joining the queues to enter our favourite tourist places in ever greater numbers. China is finally engaging with the world and, in tourism at least, the effects are phenomenal.

In just a few years, it has leapt up the league table of tourist-generating nations to first place, with more than 135 million international departures in 2016. China's tourists have been increasing in double digits since 2010, and most experts agree that 200 million Chinese will be travelling abroad every year by 2021.

The Chinese are not only travelling abroad in ever greater numbers, they're spending far more money than other countries (five times as much as the British).

The British and the Americans used to set the pace in international travel: their entrepreneurs led the way in investing in new properties and establishing standards and patterns of growth for international holiday resorts.

But Western domination is history. Now, when major tourist destinations devise their development plans for the future, China is top of the list of the nations they want to attract. Cruise lines are falling over themselves to find a product the Chinese like (it's more difficult to find something to their taste than you might think).

The growth of tourism from China is also certain to impact on our own foreign travel plans. As cities such as Venice reach maximum capacity, pressure will grow for measures – almost certainly financial – to limit entry.

Faced with this prospect, 2018 is a good time to re-examine your 'bucket list' ambitions. Here are some suggestions…

Visits to the Louvre and the Mona Lisa are already run to timed entries and with military precision. Photo / Pawel Libera, Getty

1. If you want to go, go now…

If you've long-harboured a desire to visit Venice, Rome and Paris, prioritise plans to go this year. If you thought the queue to get up the Eiffel Tower or Venice's Campanile was bad a couple of years ago, imagine what it will be like in two years' time.

Already, a visit to any of the most popular cities needs to be planned with military precision to avoid infuriatingly long queues.

Use the internet to get timed entries into mega-popular sights such as the Sistine Chapel in Rome.

And we will all have to work harder to find alternatives to the most crowded attractions.

In some cases – such as ascending the Campanile of San Giorgio Maggiore, a short ferry ride across the lagoon from St Mark's Square, instead of climbing St Mark's Campanile – it is cheaper, better and much less crowded.

If you're visiting the Louvre in Paris, concentrate on seeing a handful of its treasures (probably not the Mona Lisa, unless you have very sharp elbows). Better still, head for another of Paris's lesser-known but equally satisfying museums such as the Rodin Museum on the Boulevard des Invalides.

Specialists offering a range of European city breaks include: Thomas Cook (thomascook.com/holidays/city-breaks/); Kirker Holidays (kirkerholidays.co.uk), which has packages to a range of luxury hotels; and Superbreak (superbreak.com), which offers a range of city breaks from airports around the UK.

2. Follow the fashion of taking 'special' trips

Just going on a foreign holiday used to be sufficiently unusual.

Where you went to or why you went were hardly considered. A beach was a beach: as long as the sun shone, everything was just fine. But as the package holiday business gets close to celebrating its 70th birthday, more and more travellers – especially younger ones – draw up their travel plans with an end in sight.

The joys of 'beach Thailand' have been eclipsed by a desire to discover 'real Thailand' – to take a tour that leads you off the beaten track and shows you the life of ordinary Thais.

This 'purposeful' travel is also luring more senior adventurers who are keen to sign up for 'voluntourism' projects that help developing countries. People are hoping for some sort of life-changing experience.

Now, more than ever, it makes sense to plan a holiday that is likely to take you far from the madding crowd and let you do something to aid disadvantaged people.

InsideAsia Tours (insideasiatours.com) is a specialist company offering tailor-made itineraries to Japan, Burma, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.

Expert Africa (expertafrica.com) is an Africa specialist, offering high-quality, tailor-made trips to Southern and East Africa.

TravelLocal (travellocal.com) is the 'buy local' expert in tailor-made holidays, putting independent travellers in direct contact with tried-and-trusted travel companies in more than 40 destinations worldwide.

For volunteering expeditions, visit eu.earthwatch.org/expeditions.

Village Ways (villageways.com) works with remote communities in Thailand, India, Nepal, Georgia, Ethiopia and Spain.

3. Choose a cruise

One of the most promising ways of avoiding tourist gridlock is the cruise. The current model of Western Mediterranean cruises, which plough a nautical furrow around Barcelona, Pisa and Rome, will have to be revised.

Cruise lines have the potential to open up lesser-known ports: this is already happening on the Adriatic, where Dubrovnik is being challenged by ports such as Pula.

Expect cruises to become more of a learning experience where you split your time between soaking up some sun and learning how to cook or paint.

River cruises are also rapidly gaining more popularity. While they inevitably focus on the likes of Vienna, Budapest and Nuremberg, they can also go to equally charming towns and villages on the Rhine, Danube, Rhone and Douro. There are also 'cruises' that don't involve sailing. Railway journeys led by guides have become more affordable.

Again, while they can include major cities, their particular delight is that they will take you to places off the beaten track – to the Harz mountains of Germany, for example, where steam railways are still alive and well.

Ocean cruise operators include Jules Verne (vjv.com), which offers a range of cruises such as Destination North Pole, island-hopping in the Maldives and In The Wake Of The Vikings, a trip from Britain to Iceland and onwards to the Faroe Islands.

For river cruises, visit Avalon Waterways (avaloncruises.co.uk), APT (aptouring.co.uk), Tauck (tauck.co.uk/river-cruises), Cosmos (cosmos.co.uk) and River Cruise Line (rivercruiseline.co.uk).

Escorted rail holidays are available through Arena Rail Holidays (arena travel.com), which offers holidays in Italy, France, Germany, Corsica, Switzerland, Sardinia and Holland.

McKinlay Kidd (mckinlaykidd.com) offers train trips in England, Scotland and Ireland.