A hotel representative said more mainland families are spending the National Day Golden Week holiday in Hong Kong this year as it overlaps with the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Alan Chan, chief operations officer at Miramar Group, told RTHK the company's hotels in Tsim Sha Tsui and Wan Chai are more than 90 percent full and that room rates have gone up by 9 to 11 percent from a year ago.

He said spectacles like the Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance are a proven attraction for tourists.

"Because the National Day Golden Week holiday this year is quite long, and it overlaps with Mid-Autumn Festival, the festive atmosphere is strong," he said.

"When it comes to travelling, Hong Kong's festive atmosphere is better than foreign places."

As for High Island Reservoir East Dam, New Territories South East constituency lawmaker Stanley Li said the popular tourist attraction could be inundated with taxis, even though the Transport Department has arranged for the number of minibuses heading to the scenic area to be stepped up during the Golden Week holiday.

The stepped-up service will see at least 30 minibuses, along with standby vehicles and drivers, operate over the eight-day mainland break, instead of the four that usually ply the route during weekends and other public holidays.

However, Li said: "Tourists, especially those from the mainland, may head to East Dam directly by taxi once they pass through border checkpoints. So you have people heading there from different places, and you don't know [how they get there]. So it is difficult to tell.

"Also, the passenger volume of a taxi is low. A minibus has more than a dozen seats, while a taxi only has a few. So I'm a bit worried, and I expect there could be hundreds of taxis causing congestion there."

But Li believes the number of taxis is sufficient to handle the expected surge in tourists, as not all minibuses were used up when the same arrangement was put in place during the Labour Day Golden Week.

More than 1.5 million visitors and about 1,200 tourist groups are expected to head to Hong Kong between October 1 and 8.