just starting to plan for china..I'm overwhelmed
 

We are planning a trip to China, perhaps in the fall of 2008...definitely after the Olympics. We will be an adult family of 5 and want to go for about 20 days. We are used to independent travel, but we've always been able to speak a little of the language. But this is different. I am thinking that we will need a guide/driver some of the time, but not all the time. I would love to get advise and get some idea of what kind of a budget I should plan on, if we are thinking about 3/4 star hotels.

I travelled to China this May, and the posts here were very helpful, so read back. I am a very experienced traveler, always planned trips for husband and I independently. Because I was travelling alone, I chose a tour. There were advantages in some places by making transfers easy and getting to distant locations. I went to some sites alone, and found taxis readily available. Consider arranging local guides through referals on this site or through your hotels. I would insist that they not take me to all the shopping stops that tour groups are forced to do, as I thought the merchandise was not great and they were a waste of time. 5 of you will need a van, so arranging for this ahead of time is a must. As an example, if you take a taxi to the Temple of Heaven, you may be taken to one of 2 entrances, but a group of 5 might be in 2 cabs and you won't necessarily be taken to the same entrance. Cab drivers don't speak Enlgish, so you can't coordinate. You simply hand them a card with the name of your destination written in Chinese (my hotel in Beijing had pre-printed cards with all the sites, you checked off your destination and gave to driver).
Each person in your group should always carry a card with the name of the hotel written in Chinese. With 5 of you, should you become separated you can be assured of reuniting at the hotel.

I don't know what you expect for a 3 star hotel, be careful. A 4 star runs about $100 a day and I was happily surprised by the quality. I found good restaurant recommendations on this site and hotel staff sent many in our group to nearby restaurants. We laughed at having really good dinners for $8 per person with beer. My most epensive dinners were Peiking Duck dinner for less than $20 including beer, and a fabulous and elegant Italian dinner at the Hilton at Shanghai for about $30.

If you are traveling to popular tourist cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Xi'an), then you really don't need a guide. Local transportation via subway or taxi is cheap, clean and plentiful and there are enough signs in English and very helpful bilingual people who can assist if you need it.

Tip 1: If you ever get lost or need help, just go to the nearest hotel. The doormen and hotel staff almost always speak English and will take care of visitors even if you aren't staying there.

Tip 2: Buy a tri-lingual map (English, Chinese and Pinyin) and always print out the address of your hotel (or get a pre-printed "taxi card" from the concierge) in Chinese since most taxi drivers do not speak English. The hotel concierge can also write out any location you want in Chinese for the driver.

For 1-day side trips outside the major cities, you can arrange a guide/driver through your hotel or join a local group tour such as Jinjiang or Panda.

For longer trips or if you want to visit rural areas, it might be best to arrange a custom tour or hire a guide/driver.

In terms of budget, most hotel rates include a full buffet breakfast. You don't say how many rooms you'll need, but plan on $100-$150/night per room. There is a lot of speculation on whether hotel rates might be higher or lower after the Olympics.

You can pick up a light snack for lunch for well under $10. Even dinner can be quite inexpensive (under $20). With a group of 5, I suggest ordering many local dishes to share so you can try a little of everything. Or you can splurge at one of the Western restaurants in town.

You have received some good advice so far. First agonizing law of independent travel in China is booking very close to the departure date. Your airfare most likely will not drop from the stratosphere until about 6-8 weeks before departure. Your hotels are at their lowest prices (except for Golden Week, national vacations, in this case, 10/1/08 to 10/7/08) about two weeks before your arrival date.

My impression of China cities and the countryside is that you can get a 4-star reliably for less than $100. Some special times you can pick up at 5-star for under $100 in Beijing and Shanghai. Prices elsewhere in China are apt to be much lower. Figure an average of $80 a night per room. In Shanghai you can get a two-bedroom apartment for under $70 a night, for example.

Taxis throughout China are cheap and plentiful. Most of your local touring will be in taxis (or taxi vans), and most without guides. Fodors and Lonely Planet have good books to plan the trip. Buy the DK Eyewitness Travel Guide for the best site by site tour guide with reliable information and no shopping stops and tips! The airports and subways of Beijing and Shanghai are completely bilingual.

Yes, you can navigate China on your own. Just be sure to remember to bargain for most everything all the time. Unless it is the taxi meter, or subway fare, or admission cost to a govt tour site, most prices are negotiable.

In each city you can make arrangement for independent tour guides. You will get hints on this forum as well as the others of tripadvisor and lonelyplanet. Good luck! I think that the planning and excitement are part of the great thrill in international travel.

for the hotle price,it is too early talking it.should remember that no one know the exact price after Olympic Games,every one hope the price will down,but who knows.

HI

Excellent information provided here. I was glad when I found a site for guides in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. It is called personal china helper at www.personalchinahelper.com. They can help to adjust at these large cities from which you might go on your own or consider other touring options.

Plenty of people prefer independent travel but for first time China, it might be worthwhile to consider touring or partial touring. China Highlights at www.chinahighlights.com is a Chinese agency offering a variety of short and longer tours. You might also get ideas for itineraries and other information on their site.

For an American tour operator, Chinaspree at www.chinaspree.com, has been getting a lot of good feedback. Orient Flexipax Tours at orientflexipax.com is an experienced and more upscale operator. They also have several short tours which might be relevant. These are some operators I could think of.

Good Luck

rploehn,

I'm heading to China October 10th 2008 for about 24 days wtih my cousin. We'll start in Beijing and work our way down to Hong Kong.

You state "Your hotels are at their lowest prices (except for Golden Week, national vacations, in this case, 10/1/08 to 10/7/08) about two weeks before your arrival date."

Is it safe to wait until the end of September 2008 to book my hotels?

Thanks!

Monica ((F))

Hi again Monica,

China travel has several quirks. One of them is the prices go down, not up, near the date of service. This applies to internal air fares as well as hotels. Right after a Golden Week, in this case National Week for the founding of the PRC on Oct. 1, business hotel prices climb high. So your Westin, Intercontinental and Ritz Carlton are almost rack rates. All business travel came to a halt for the national holiday week, and now it comes back. Tourist hotels have different rate characteristics. They will be coming down from the National Week high prices.

What I usually do is to make a non-prepaid but guaranteed reservation up front. (That is Plan "B" to make sure I have a room at a convenient place.) Then I wait until 2 to 3 weeks out and check all the prices again. Some have dropped 50% at tourist hotels. I snap up what I like.

Specifically to your case, make reservations up front and you get the full prices or seasonal prices. Then three weeks before departure begin checking hotels again on places such as ctrip.com and elong.com. When you find a suitable place and price, always check the hotel's own web site, as prices may be lower than the ctrip price. Western reservation services also can be accessed by bookingbuddy.com or kayak.com.

Prices are so volatile in capitalist China that some people walk into their hotel and ask for today's best rate before telling them they have a reservation. Then they compare prices.

This is the way you beat even group tour prices in China. When you compare rates one year out, you might conclude you could save 20-40% by booking a group tour. When you end up booking your internal flights and hotels two weeks beforehand, you will see the prices go lower in most cases. Also, fly into Shenzhen and take the short transit train to Hong Kong. You might save 50% over flights into the high cost Hong Kong airport.

Hi rploehn,

You state: “Prices are so volatile in capitalist China that some people walk into their hotel and ask for today's best rate before telling them they have a reservation. Then they compare prices.”

Am I correct that most hotels in China have the same "6pm cancellation" policy? If so, then I can see use walkingin and comparing prices.

Also, thanks for the Shenzhen flight suggestion. Would you know if there are several flights per day to Shenzhen? We'd like to get to HK early enough to enjoy the afternoon with some sightseeing and not arrive at night.

Monica ((F))

There are about 18 PEK-SZX flights a day. About the same for PEK-HKG.

Checking fares on elong for the next few weeks, non-stop PEK-SZX isn't that cheap. About 1400RMB one-way. Unless you connect though Shanghai.

Non-stop PEK-HKG start from about 1700RMB. I'll probably spend the extra 300RMB to save the trouble with the transfer from SZX to Hong Kong.

Hi Monica,

Each hotel has different policies, and indeed if you plan to arrive after 6 pm you should have a guaranteed reservation which is not cancelable at that point. The idea is to check rates very close to your check-in date, if not the same day. Also, on intra-China fares, taxes and surcharges are quoted separately, so be sure to compare the "all-in" rate. Lowest prices will come from buying the intra-China tickets through your hotel or CITC agency in China, so they should quote the total price.

linbob and monicapileggi should buy a couple of guide books each, maybe Fodors and DK Eyewitness Travel Guide and consult the "practical information" sections for the lowdown on China travel.

Independent travel is the best way to go, seeing what you want to see, not what the group tour company wants to show you. You also avoid the daily one-hour shopping/factory/refreshment stops where the tour guide and driver get the kickbacks from the place for dropping you there. There are many other reasons for independent travel, too many to cite here.

I also recommend Lonely Planet's guides to China. Not the best for sightseeing info, but clear winners on logistics. They also print place names in Chinese characters as well as pinyin - makes independent travel much easier.

Hi linbob,

China is a wonderful place! It is a pretty tough place to travel, although easier than it used to be. You might want to look at doing a guided tour. Here is a great site for researching guided cultural, adventure, and other tour operators:

http://www.voyagetrek.com

Have fun!

CH

I do have the DK Eyewitness Travel Guide, but haven't finished going through it. I hope that Frommers will put out a new book on China in the fall for 2008. Not sure how often they print new editions.

Monica ((F))

I've just returned (last night) from 11 amazing days in Beijing and I need to respectfully disagree with Lia.

Although it's certainly possible to survive, and have an enjoyable trip to Beijing on your own, I wouldn't think of doing it without a guide and van/driver for at least some of the time. Prices for guides and drivers are quite reasonable and I think you'll get much more out of your visit.

I'll join the chorus and suggest that you read ekscrunchy's excellent trip report, "Back from 21 Superb Days in Seoul, Beijing, Shanghai". I'll also highly recommend our guide, Kong Lin. We used Lin (with his driver Mr. Mao) for our airport transfers, visits to all the usual Beijing highlights and for a truly memorable day at the Great Wall at Huanyaguan and the Eastern Qing Tombs.

Kong Lin's email address is [email protected].

I have one important travel tip for anyone visiting Beijing in the summer. Take plenty of water with you every day and DRINK IT. I had no health problems, whatsoever, from the food, water or pollution, but I got dehydrated from all the walking in the heat and humidity. It resulted in very little sleep that night and nearly ruined the following day.