help! going to China for 1st time
 

We are plannign a trip to China and would like some suggestions regarding length of stay in the following cities:
Hangzhou
Shanghai
Beijing
We will be visiting college child at the end of her abroad program and suggested durations in each city would be greatly appreciated.
Any must have travel books?
Thank you!

Have you found an agency that will help you book your flights? hotels? etc?

now this is entertainment :)

Just in the very early planning stages. A trip to China seems so overwhelming bcs. there are so many options. We do have a travel agent but I wanted to give him more parameters such as length of stay, etc.. We don't know if 12 days is enough for those 3 cities or if we need to add more days, etc...

Just thought I'd throw it out there. After reading more of the boards I am starting to get a general sense of time frames.

Hawaiian traveler, I'm a local girl.

That's doable in 12 days, marksfour. I wouldn't give Hangzhou more than 2 days (others may disagree), so you could split the rest say 6 days Beijing, 4 days Shanghai. I'm sure there'll be some who think that's too much for Shanghai, but we liked the place.

You could consider substituting Suzhou for Hangzhou, or allocating an extra day for it. It's not far from Shanghai. We spent 2 nights in Hangzhou and one in Suzhou and with the benefit of hindsight would have reversed that - but everyone's experience of a place is different, and we may not have given Hangzhou a fair shake.

Thank you Neil Oz. That was just the info. I was looking for! Daughter ending abroad studies in Hangzhou and I think adding Suzhou is a great idea. Now I will have fun researching places to stay at.

Agree with Neil on 6 days in Beijing, a couple or three in Hangzhou to do what you need to and I would personally skip Shanghai and go to Kunming.

Aloha!

Some people prefer to spend more time in each place, others want to visit more places. If you want to go to Kunming/Lijiang or Guilin/Yangshou, you can do Beijing in 4 days and Shanghai in 2.

You can easily spend a week in Beijing and visit:
* Forbidden city
* Summer Palace
* Fragrant Hills
* Great Wall (I suggest the Mutianyu section)
* Take a two day trip from Beijing to Chengde
* Lama Temple, Red Snail Temple...visits
* etc.
My blog http://travel.chinafinds.com has a bunch of info on day trips
Shanghai will take another 3 days
From Shanghai you can visit Zhouzhuang (one of the water towns) before heading over to Hangzhou.... Have a great trip

Thank you for the blog link and to everyone for your suggestions!

In Beijing,Temple of heaven,789 Art factory,underground city,Opera maybe you cant miss!I suggest get a local guide in each city is much helpful.I used a guide in Beijing,we had a good time with him.his Email:[email protected] Have a nice tour!