Most of the Shanghai tourists stranded in Thailand were brought back to the city over the weekend by domestic airlines, Shanghai tourism authorities said yesterday.

Only 82 out of the 436 city tourists were still in Thailand last night, according to the Shanghai Tourism Administrative Commission.

On Saturday, aircraft from Shanghai Airlines and China Eastern flew to Thailand to bring back Chinese tourists.

Shanghai Airlines sent a second aircraft to pick up more tourists yesterday. It arrived in Thailand's Utapao Airport near Pattaya, about 150 kilometers east of Bangkok, yesterday afternoon and took off with 170 Chinese tourists at around 7pm, heading back to Shanghai.

Tourists said although they were exhausted, they were not upset by the anti-government protests in Bangkok.

"The tourists were generally in a good mood," said Qiu Yaoping, a tour guide with the Shanghai Jinjiang Travel Service Co who got back on Saturday. Qiu said the 21 members of the group first went to Phuket Island by bus and then flew back to the city via Hong Kong.

"We didn't see any turmoil," said Qiu. "We didn't dare go out of the hotel in case we ran into anything dangerous."

"We all felt lucky to be back rather early," Qiu added.

(Shanghai Daily December 1, 2008)