The Travel section of the LA Times has an interesting article on the fledgling national parks of China and talks about how the culture is not yet embracing the outdoor experience.

“For now,” she said, “Chinese tourists don’t travel like you, carrying a backpack into the mountains and going camping. A very small group of Chinese people are doing that, but most of them are just getting on buses and going to overlooks.”

I suppose that in many ways, the popularity of outdoor activities like backpacking and camping is a measure of a society’s wealth, since wealth leads to an increased amount of leisure time.