Wealthy Chinese driving enthusiasts are paying nearly $4,000 to spend a week navigating German freeways, where speed limits are often merely recommended, as fast as a high-performance BMW, Mercedes or Audi can carry them.

"At weekends back home we go for drives," one tourist told the Times. "But we all wanted to be able to say we had driven at high speeds on the German motorway system. They are very famous, mythical even."

The driving vacations, offered by leading tour operator TUI and others, are part of a concerted effort to attract Chinese tour groups to Germany, which in 2003 became the first European country put on the Chinese government’s list of approved tourist destinations.

Since then, Chinese travellers have headed west to Germany in record numbers and now represent the third largest tourist nationality from abroad, with more than 120,000 visitors expected this year.

Many of those visitors are coming with full pockets and plans to hit the stores. The Chinese are estimated to spend more per capita while in Germany than travelers from any other country except for Russia.

Still, not everyone is pleased with the prospect of a Chinese invasion on Germany’s autobahns.

Safety advocates say that Chinese drivers are often ignorant of Germany’s rules of the road. They note that Chinese drivers have been spotted running red lights, tailgating and even committing the cardinal sin of traffic violations in Germany — passing on the right.

Tour operators admit that the finer points of driving etiquette are sometimes lost in translation, but deny that Chinese tourists constitute a traffic menace.