NANCHANG, March 20 (Xinhua) -- Now that spring is in the air, crowds of tourists are flocking to east China's Wuyuan County, dubbed "China's most beautiful village," to see "the sea of cole flowers."

A total of 8,000 hectares of cole flowers are blooming in Wuyuan, Jiangxi Province. The flowers, coupled with local distinctive buildings and terraces, attracted 250,000 visitors on March 16 and 17, a record high, according to the county government.

The number is expected to peak on March 23 and 24, authorities said, and the most famous local tourist attraction, the Huangling ancient village, will limit the number of tickets to 28,000.

Family inns in Wuyuan are in high demand, and homestays in Huangling ancient village have all been reserved.

"The weather is good, and I really enjoy seeing the sea of flowers and staying in rural homestays," said Xiang Hongfu, a tourist from neighboring Anhui Province.

To cater to the boom in tourism, Wuyuan authorities have built seven parking lots. Last year, the county invested about 1.7 billion yuan (254 million U.S. dollars) to build more roads.

Last year, a team of Jiangxi Agricultural University developed cole flowers in 17 colors to help tourism in the province. Compared to regular cole flowers, the new varieties look better and contain more anthocyanin, a type of blue, violet, or red pigment, according to Fu Donghui, who led the research.

The county receives more than 5 million tourists each year, bringing in a revenue of more than 3 billion yuan.