Exploring "turtle island", taking day trips to neighboring Lombok and hitting Bali's beaches, the world's biggest-spending tourists were back after the Lunar New Year kicked off and Beijing reopened to the world last month.

"I am especially happy to travel because, before the pandemic, I was someone who liked to travel a lot, going all over to see the sights, experience different cultures and people," Li Zhao-long, a 28-year-old internet-company worker from Kunming in southwest Yunnan province, told AFP.

"Three years on, being able to come from China to Indonesia, I am extremely happy and overjoyed."

Chinese holidaymakers have endured years of lockdowns and travel restrictions driven by Beijing's fervent pursuit of its "zero-COVID" policy, followed by a sudden reopening and accompanying spike in infections. 

Now a lucky few armed with selfie-sticks and clad in tropical shirts and straw hats are on long-awaited getaways to the “Island of the Gods”.

In recent years Chinese visitor numbers to Bali plunged after both countries closed their borders at the height of the pandemic.

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