Blooming lovely: why people are breaking INTO a jail in southern China

(SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST)Part of a prison in southern China has become an unlikely tourist attraction, with people breaking into the jail to see peach trees in bloom, according to a newspaper report.

Thousands of people have visited the prison in Guilin to see the blossom in a compound at the security facility, the Nanguo Zaobao reported.

Visitors were banned last Thursday from entering the site because of cases of people pulling branches off the trees or littering the area, but they are still coming, with some climbing over a fence to get in, according to the article.

The number of visitors reached 10,000 earlier this month.

Peach trees cover an area of three hectares at a staff residential compound at the jail.

One woman who climbed over the prison’s wall was quoted as telling an officer who came to stop her that she had come all the way from the centre of the city and really wanted to see the beautiful blossoms.

The peach trees were planted in 2006 and few people visited before, according to prison officers.

But starting from mid-February when the peach trees were in full bloom, visitors to the compound peaked.

The peach trees were declared out of bounds on February 25, but some visitors are allowed in if they get signed permission from a member of staff at the jail.