Idnas71

Hello all... I read about Jane Yeo's private tour company here on Fodors and after a third attempt to contact her, I finally heard back today. I had heard it was difficult to make that first contact, and that turned out to be true. But I was asking about January of 2008, so I can imagine she may have more pertinent questions to attend to at this time.

Anyway, I was looking to hire her for about 3-4 days to take two friends and I to see the main sites in Beijing, the Great Wall, and the Terra Cotta Warriors. She forgot to include the visit to the T.C. Warriors in my quote, but added in some other activities which sound great, too. Got a price quote of $600 USD for the three of us. Is that pretty reasonable? Here's the text of the e-mail she sent me.

I am very glad to get your mail. I wish you a nice day first!
>
> > We provide high quality private tour service. About your visit, I
> give you an itinerary for you as your reference. You can change it in
your visit with complete freedom and flexibility.

Day tour 1: Airport picking up, Forbidden city, Tiananmen square, Chairman mao Mausoleum. Temple of Heaven, which is also a nice
place in Beijing
acrobats show in the evening, tickets not included in, I will order it for you, when you want to do it here.

> > Day tour 2: Great wall,Mutianyu section
> >This section is a beautiful section, we will take cable car up and
slide down by Toboggan, Mutianyu even has tobogon to slide down the wall
after your visit. Will be of great fun.
>
> Day tour 3: Summer palace, lama temple, , beijing zoo, hutong, shopping in the local market. Transfer back to the airport
Cost including: guide, admission tickets, and lunch for 3 days, round rip transfer to the airport. , minivan rental.
>
> >600usd for all the services mentioned above for 4 people totally,
and each person 150usd totally.
Best wishes,
Jane

I also asked her for advice about getting a one-way air ticket from Beijing to Hong Kong, and lastly about taking a two or three day tour into Siem Reap from Hong Kong to visit the temples at Angkor Wat.

Would anyone care to comment on anything about this? I'm all ears...

Thanks in advance!
Sandi

Shanghainese

I can't comment on the price but please note that the Terra Cotta Warriors are in Xian, not in Beijing.

Idnas71

Thanks... yes, I knew the T.C. warriors were not in Beijing, but it seems to be a day-trip offered by Jane Yeo's tour company, which I had inquired about in my original request with her. I'm hoping she can still add it on for me.

Shanghainese

A daytrip from Beijing to Xian?! Roundtrip flight would be 5 hours, plus in/out airports, cities, plus the traveling and site seeing time to the TC Warriors. Unless you take overnight trains, I still think it's difficult.

hawaiiantraveler

your quote says 3 people for 600 dollars and Jane's quote says 4 people for 600.

Either way its only 50 dollars per person per day for 4 and 75 per day for 3 people.

there are people who would say you can do it cheaper by yourself but if touring is comfortable for you then I would say the price sounds right to me.

Aloha!

ekscrunchy

It sounds expensive to me but I guess you need a large vehicle if the tour includes both a guide and driver. The Chairman Mao Mausoleum is closed, by the way; I am not sure of the re-opening date.

Day two is really only a half day unless you are planning to do some hiking along the Wall. And I would not want lunch to be included...wouldn't you
rather choose your own meals?

I would think twice about having someone in Beijing arrange a my travel to Cambodia. Better to do this through Hong Kong if that is your departure point, or with a local operator.

travelgirl2

We used Jane for 1 day touring around Beijing. We were 4 people and she brought a private van and driver. I don't have my notes with me now, but I recall she charged $50 per person.

When we called her, she got right back to us, as we were already in Beijing and were looking to schedule a day with her immediately.

It was very efficient to have the car and driver. They were waiting for us after each stop and quickly took us to the next stop. We saw a lot more in that one day than we could have seen by ourselves.

I would highly recommend letting Jane take you to lunch too. She took us to a very good restaurant where we seemed to be the only non-Chinese people. No way we would have found that place on our own, and if we did find it, everything was in Chinese so it would have been very difficult to order. It was one of our highlights in Beijing. Not a tourist trip, as some guides seem to do, but more of a local place that she was sharing with us.

We chose to just book a group tour out to the Great Wall. I think it was through Gray Line (sorry, again I don't have my notes with me). It was a bit of a drive to the wall and then we wanted to wander along the wall ourselves, so we didn't feel the need for a private guide that day. We didn't know anything about the toboggan, though, and that sounds like lots of fun. So Jane could probably give you more of an insider's tour than the group tour we took (which we primarily took because we wanted a ride out to the wall and didn't want to go through the hassle of booking a taxi driver privately).

I didn't use Jane for anything outside of Beijing or to make hotel or plane reservations, so I can't speak to those things. We did book the van to get back to the airport and she charged a lot less than the hotel charged us (on arrival), but more than just taking a taxi would have been. It was worth it to have the smiling driver promptly show up at our hotel with the air conditioned van.

Not sure if you read my report - it is Travelgirl's Trip of a Lifetime - China Excerpt - Summer of 2006

ekscrunchy

Travelgirl:

I did read your wonderful report!! That is a good point about eating; of course it would be good to go with someone who knows the food. I was thinking more along the lines of a restuarant oriented toward tourists where all the buses pull in and they offer some kind of not-very-interesting set lunch. But obviously that was not your experience.

Also I agree about how convenient it is to have a car and driver, even within Beijing.

The toboggan begins right at the Mutianyu gate; you can see it below you as you ascend on the chair lift.

Idnas71

Thanks for the different opinions, folks. I knew the number of people on Jane's quote was a discrepancy but I thought maybe that was just a minimum # of people required on a tour thing that we would just have to absorb if we wanted to have the services of this particular company. I just need to confirm that with Jane. Haven't looked into any other options yet for Beijing as I picked up on several people here recommending Jane Yeo and I just went with that for now.

I really didn't know how far away the Terra Cotta Warriors were from Beijing, I just knew it was an option from Jane's website. I have yet to hear back from her any further about that, though.

I think I would enjoy spending some significant time walking along the Great Wall. Although I'm sure it will be freezing cold in January and that may make a difference.

Usually, I'm a pretty independent traveler. Although, I'm not fond of renting a car to drive myself in a foreign country. Would rather use public transport or hire a driver, at least.

I will check around for other private guide possibilities and compare before booking anything.

Also, I'll look for your trip report, Travelgirl. Thank you for pointing it out to me.

I really wasn't looking to book a tour to Siem Reap through Jane's company, or a Beijing company, for that matter, but I did ask if she could recommend a different company or private guide as she is in the business and I just thought she might have something to say about it.

Thanks again to everyone for sharing your thoughts.

travelgirl2

ldnas71 - Hope you have a good trip. China is definitely not a place to be driving around. Well, millions of people seem to be doing it, but I wouldn't want to be one of them! Everything is chaotic and there are cars, bikes and people all sharing the road, with no seeming right-of-way.

We are independent travellers too, but when we arrived in China, we went for a long walk and it was so overwhelming that we went back to our apartment and went online to look up some tour guides for the next 3 days. Once we had a little assistance, we loved China.

ekscrunchy - hi! Yes, I thought that's what you were getting at, about lunch. I think the government-type tours have to take people to certain government-run restaurants and shops, which are probably mediocre. I wanted to mention it to ldnas71 because Jane's lunch was nothing like that.

scotchman9

A trip to Xi'an would at best be, overnight train to Xi'an, day tour to the TC Warriors and other sights along the way, and then an overnight train back to Beijing. When I went there last year there were all sorts of "tour Guides" swarming around me as I can out of the train station. I can not speak for the quality of them, I arranged a tour through my hotel (stayed for 3 days). One thing good about the over night trains is you can save the cost of 2 nights at a hotel in Beijing and a soft sleeper (1st class) round trip should be a lot cheaper than a night in Beijing. As for driving around NO NO NO, it is total confusion and the last time I check you can not even rent a car in China. Also you need a Chinese drivers license, no others are legal.

konglinbeijing

Does this quote including transportation from Beijing to xi`an and Xi`an to Beijing?if not,it`s expensive to do it.Mao Mausoleum will be opened to public in Sep in this year.

barnetda

We hired Jane yesterday for a trip to the Great Wall at Mutianyu.
She collected us at our hotel at 8.30 am with her driver and we spent a wonderful day with her.
The trip to the wall included a supeb lunch in a local restaurant. Exceptional food.
Upon our return to Beijing Jane included a quick look at the Olympic Stadium and a stop to look at some Hutongs.
She is really helpful and a great guide.

I would strongly recommend her.