Start by packing light. Take one small wheeled suitcase each and check them. Don't pack heavy carryon bags which have to be lifted into overhead bins. Fly between cities. If you think you need help after you've retrieved your checked luggage, ask the hotels to arrange transportation to and from the airport. Hotel arranged transport is more expensive than getting a cab but much cheaper than using a tour for managing your luggage. And, of course, restrain your buying. No life size terracotta warriors for the living room. Enjoy your trip!

we are 69 in 2 weeks and we just did it.. allow the hotel boys to do the work and the taxi drivers... so you only have to go from train to taxi stand on your own..

pack light---one 22-244 " bag each---must be rollies and one smaller carry on... hire nporters where they are available..

L I G H T

I agree with both Marija and Bob. There are always people glad to handle your luggage for you - porters on trains, cab drivers, etc. Getting a hotel car is also an easy way to have your luggage taken care of. You can hire a car and driver for the day to take you shopping and can arrange for shipping if you buy a lot.

We tend to travel "heavy" and utilize help from porters, bellmen, etc.

Thank you all for you encouragement. I am very conflicted...know I don't want to go on a tour and yet am worried that we may not be able to handle making all the arrangements ourselves.
I loved reading your report Marija, wonder if the agency you used for internal flights, etc. is still a viable option...notice the report was from 2005.
If you were to do it again, would you follow the same route?
Thanks for your kind help...it is wonderful that people take the time from their lives to help others with their journeys. Real person accounts and suggestions and recommendations, are truly invaluable.

one key is to stay in nice places... i prefer the big chains for that...marriott, hyatt, sheraton and some of the asian chains too.

map out what you think you might like to do and come back here and tell us... we are not shy about making comments to help you... we will plan with you...

Can you make all of your own arrangements to travel to other foreign countries? If so, you can do the same for China.

eenie--you don't need an agency. You can book everthing yourself online. The agency we used for our bookings is still around,

http://wacts.com/

As you noted our trip was almost 8 years ago so I don't have any current info about them. But we were satisfied with all of the arrangements they made. It's also easy to hire guides from the hotels. You may feel more comfortable if you have an agency that makes all the arrangements for you and is on call in China if you have problems.

I was pleased with the routing but would skip the Yangtze cruise. Our time in Guillin was too short. I wish we would have gone to see the rice terraces and villages. Xian was too rushed but that was due to boat and plane schedules.

Enjoy your trip. You can certainly do it yourself and hire any help you may need.

As others are saying, if you can travel on your own outside of China, you should be able to travel on your own in China!

You might find some helpful information in my trip report - just click on my name to find it.

It's a fascinating place - I hope you find a way to see it that suits you!

It is no different in China if you can use the web. You can book hotels on the hotel websites or use some websites to do the research first. Once you land (probably in Beijing or Shanghai) you just go to the taxi linup (as anywhere else). If you wish to travel by plane between cities you just go to www.ctrip.com (you can book hotels there also). Train tickets are a little more tricky but except for Xi'An you probably want to fly.
If need be you can hire a guide on some days, they are fairly cheap. You also need to hire a driver to the Great Wall.

Having had to go by tour in 1984 (mandatory) I was happy to be able to do it on our own in 2007. Absolutely no trouble. Our plan was simple but effective. I booked all our flights with "wacts" as mentioned by Marija aove. All tickets were delivered to our Beijing hotel a week in advance of our arrival. In addiiton. just to have car service, we booked local guides in BJ, Xian and Guilin, did not feel we needed one in Shanghai. ..and for Xian where our guide stood us up, we hired a delightful female taxi driver...to drive us to the terra cotta GI's (where I had seen in 1984,just a few years after they had been discovered). She waited about two hours, took us to our hotel and picked us up to take us to the airport a day later...all for $40 plus a nice tip.

Our driver in BJ took us to Mutianyu section of the wall and we spent the day with him, summer palace,bell tower, etc. (Konglin, of Fodors fame). Guide we chose in Guilin (Jadeleo)did everything we asked, plus! We stayed in Guilin, he drove us to Reed Flute Cave, to the Li River cruise port to Yangshuo...met us two days later in Yangshuo, arranged for the famed SangJi light show, then picked us up next morning to take us three hours to the rice terraces for a memorable day. It all worked precision-like.

In Shanghai we dined with Fodor's own EKSCRUNCHY. and were on our own for four wonderful days. It can be done...honestly, I loved our tour in 1984..it turned out superbly at a time when the adventure aspect was very much at hand...getting on rickety old DC-3's and Soviet TU's air force planes is a story in itself...and we are not in any way usually tour-ers. I did not feel that we compromised independence in any way with the guide booking we did in 2007.

Frankly, as said, we hired guides primarily for their cars!! I've independently driven in many parts of the world, and China would not have been my idea of comfortable driving (even if I could), nor would have any of my trips to Russia or Uzbek SSR in old SSR days (when rentals were not in the vocabulary)... or to Belarus and Ukraine more recently in 2008. I drove in Japan way back in 1946 at 17..a jeep and a 3/4-ton army vehicle hauling anti-tamk guns, no less.

Eenie: To sum up my motor-mouth-ranting explanation...do it..don't fret a bit. If you get lost in China, perhaps you'll end up in the real Shangri-La!

jadeleo66@yahoo.com (Guilin and vicinity)
konglin316@hotmail.com (Beijing and the wall)

stu (and by the way, we were 79 and 71 in 2008..I'll post my China pics below)

https://picasaweb.google.com/stuarttower/ChinaBeijing2007#

https://picasaweb.google.com/stuarttower/ChinaXian2007

https://picasaweb.google.com/stuarttower/GuilinYangshuoLiRiverAndVicinity#

https://picasaweb.google.com/stuarttower/Shanghai200702

Loved all your answers and the inspiration that you all give so sincerely. You are a great bunch of travelers and I can easily see why you are able to get so much from your travels..you all seem to have an "I can do it" attitude and you seem unaffraid to jump righ in.

Yes, we have done Europe on our own and other places as well. Usually, just rent a car and go for it. Realize China is a bit different. In other parts of the world we could make out traffic directions and signs...even in a language we did not speak.

Is there a particular way that you chose the guides you used?
We will start researching more and come up with an itinerary for you all to critique.

Thanks again for your input and encouragement...you have me thinking "We can do it"!!

In big cities or touristy places (where you are likely to go), signage will not be an issue. You are not allowed to rent a car though. Even if you could I would not recommend it.
For guides check www.synotrip.com

I rarely use guides. And I would not hire a guide online. If you want a guide you want to be able to talk with them first to make sure you can understand each other. Especially in China, the written info you find in guidebooks is often better (more accurate) than what a guide tells you. You will need a driver from time to time. I suaually just hire a taxi driver that I can communicate with or I may ask the hotel for a recommendation.

Kathie - if you do not use guides how can you tell they are not accurate? In China one should only use licensed guides. Licensed guides need to rewrite their exam every year and also need to make presentations (in english) to keep their license. I think that it is much better to book one ahead of time and communicate with that guide than just show up and pick whoever is available. On the website that I give above, one can see comments from their other clients which is very useful. Some guides (check also on TripAdvisor) get a ton of references.

It has been a long time since I was last in China. But at that time, the guides parroted a party line about Chinese history which was simply not accurate. Others, including Peter N-H has commented on this as well. I do lots of research before my trips, and am annoyed when I know more about it than a guide does. So I usually just don't use a guide. This is a personal preference, some people love using guides.

Elsewhere in the world, I tend to use guides for places where I can't get a lot of info in advance. For instance, at Polonnaruwa in Sri Lanka, we wanted a guide (as there is relatively little published on this site that is available in the US) and our driver got us "the best" guide there. He was a wonderful guide and we learned a lot from him. We were able to buy a book there on the UNESCO sites in the cultural triangle.

In Burma, we hired a horsecart driver who turned out to be a marvelous guide and I have recommended him here. But in my decades of travel, there have been relatively few guides who have enhanced my experience of a place.

Right. A guide educated in China, trapped behind the Chinese firewall and licensed by the Chinese government is going to have a view of history that conforms to the party line. There are now guidebooks, not to mention many history books, available that will give you a more well-rounded view.

Like Kathie I rarely use guides, and when I do it's often because no public transport is available. I would rather read up on a sight while comfortably seated with a cup of coffee than stand around in front of whatever it is listening to a guide who is often telling me what I already know. (How many times do you need to hear about Greek architects' use of perspective, or how silk is produce?)

as I said, we used these guides in China primarily for there cars..and it turned out to be far more cost effective than to hire a taxi (Mutianyu is long drive from BJ)..as are the terraced rice fields wst og Guilin/Yangshuo. My guides know enough to shut up..as you, I do a tremendous amount of deep research and I have for more than 60 years of foreign travel. Still, I think getting a guide with a car is a good option, as long as ground rules are spelled out in advance.

Fortunately, BJ-guy Konglin and his lovely wife Violet were recomended to me by Ekscrunchy, a fellow Fodorite whom I have long respected..so there was not the slightest doubt in my mind...same with JadeLeo. The no-show s.o.b in Xian was only going to drive us to the terra cotta site. For short distances within a city particularly, taxis or other public transportation work fine and are cost effective. Just my fairly educated opinion.

Like Kathie and thursdaysd, I used guides only very rarely in my 4 weeks in China and only when there were other reasons (e.g., no other way to get somewhere) for doing so. And depending on where you are going, it may not be at all difficult to use public transportation.

If you do choose to hire a guide, then I think tower gives excellent advice: Be SURE the ground rules are clear in advance.