Visitors feed giraffes in the Giraffe Manor located in Miaoshan village, Huzhou's Wuxing district. [Photo/hz66.com]

Over the past weekend, Giraffe Manor in Miaoshan village welcomed no fewer than 5,000 visitors. 

The zoo's popularity is a reflection of the emergence of Miaoshan village in Huzhou, East China's Zhejiang province as a hit tourism destination.

In 2021, the village raked in 113 million yuan ($17.38 million) in tourism revenue after receiving over 400,000 tourists, most of whom are from the Yangtze River Delta, a region encompassing provinces of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui as well as Shanghai municipality, official statistics show.

Located in the center of a provincial tourist resort, the Xisai Mountain Tourist Resort, Miaoshan is 150 kilometers east of Shanghai and 90 kilometers south of Hangzhou.

Despite the influx of tourism investment - six projects including premium homestays and hotels with a combined investment value of 1.48 billion yuan landed in the village over the past six years – Miaoshan's afforestation rate still stands at above 80 percent.