Dalian -- The 6th Dalian International Walking Festival started Saturday in Dalian of Northeast China’s Liaoning province.

A toddler waves the national flag and the Olympic emblem during the walking festival. [Zhu Chengpei/China Daily]

More than 200,000 people attended the 2-day activity, including about 1,000 people from some other countries such as Russia, Japan, New Zealand and Denmark.

This morning, the pedestrians zigzagged the 30-kilometer-long Binhai Road along the sea beach. Tomorrow they will climb the 663-meter-high Daheishan Mountain in the city’s development zone.

Dalian held its 1st walking festival in 2003 and became a member of the International Federation of Pedestrian three years later.

Participants hold a banner reading: My heart is in the earthquake-hit areas. [Zhu Chengpei/China Daily]

In today’s walking stream are people from all walks of life: students, workers, clerks, civil servants, officials and foreign tourists.

On the spot, Dalian Charity Federation and some companies sponsored donation for the disaster-hit areas in Southwest China’s Sichuan Province. Many pedestrians were wearing T-shirts with Chinese characters meaning “Wenchuan, hold on”. They donated and prayed for the people suffering the devastating earthquake this Monday.