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2-3 week china visit
Aug 18, 2004 16:56
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around sep/oct would like to see and experience china as much as possible. I know it's short but any recomendations greatly appreciated.

thanks!
Aug 18, 2004 17:00
#1  
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i am from calif/usa. Your assistance in planing a visit would be very nice. Currently I am thinking Beijing and Shanghai as entry and exit city. Few places I have read that I would like to go are Xi'an, Guilin, Juizhaigou. I like traditional folk customs, historical places, beautiful nature and beautiful people. Still figuring out places to visit so any recomendations greatly appreciated.

Thank You :)

Aug 18, 2004 17:22
#2  
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it is very famous historical culture city in chinese history near Shanghai ,
Nanjing is full of traditional culture different from modern sense of Shanghai~~
The Confucius Temple and the Qinhuai River is very famous and important historical scene .
The Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum is very beautiful and peaceful place to visit~~ at the same time you can appreciate the elegant and gracious character of Sun Yat-sen , the great man in chinese contemporary history.
Nanjing Brocade has very important & special status in chinese folk custom and culture~~
welcome to Nanjing~~:) i think you will enjoy it ~~~

good luck

Aug 19, 2004 11:04
#3  
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A place you have to go if you want to know more of Chinese ancient history and philosophy.

btw, i am thinking to have a travel during Sept, maybe we can have a trip together, ;), if possible, i am also crazy on the historic places.

Sep 1, 2004 15:29
#4  
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there is a route maybe u can consider
beijing-xi'an-dali -jiuzhaigou-huangshan-nanjing-shanghai
begin from north of china and through south china and finish by east china,this travel including historical cities, modern cities and moutain and water will mkde the landscape very beautiful.how about it?
my english is so poor,but i hope this advice can help u have a excellent travel of china!

Sep 1, 2004 17:10
#5  
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Hi,
One week into the Guangdong, why not?
Macau, Hong Kong & Guangzhou are magic place!

Sep 2, 2004 02:35
#6  
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imo
beijing 4days >> xi'an 2days >> sichuan(jiuzhaigou) 3days>>>nanjing 1/2 >> shanghai 2
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yunnan>>>>nanjing>>shanghai
if u not going tibet, yunnan(lijiang/zhongdian)
sichuan(jiuzhaigou/kangding) r recommend, these place r very tibetan stlye.


depends on how big is ur budget,choose ur route.
by air is recommend, train will be uncomfortable and weste time, but save money.
guangzhou and shengzhen maybe alternative if have time coz almost same as other city.

west china r more traditional than east becoz chinese development strategy after 80's, as u know beijing shanghai guangzhou shengzhen looks more advanced
if u want go jiuzhaigou try 2 avoid 1-7/oct, the national day's big holidays.
Sep 2, 2004 09:02
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I have been to China 4 times and am also doing a 3 week return trip from Sept 23 to Oct 15.

I would recommend going from Xi'an to JiuZhaiGou then to Guilin, that way you are going in a smooth arc and not flying back north over the same area. Also Oct 1 to 8 is a national holiday week. So a lot of people will be traveling.

I have found that going to travel websites and checking the China tours to be helpful. It helps to plan the order of cities to visit and the sites to see. Get a travel book. I use lonely planet. It tells me what the normal charge for a taxi ride is from the airport to the city.

If possible, pre-plan your pickup from the airport to the hotel. If you have not made arrangements be ready to negotiate for the fare. I stayed in Yangshao, 39 km south of Gulin. The trip is about 1.5 hours from the airport. The hotel charges Y495(RMB) for the ride from the airport. I was able to negotiate the trip back to airport down Y200. I was traveling with my 2 brothers so had to pay more then the normal Y80.

Remember the exchange rate. It can be fun to negotiate if you like doing it. But my brother spent 10 minutes trying to talk a vendor down from 10Y to 8Y per DVD when I pointed out that he was haggling over less than $0.25.

Other tips: Pedestrians only have the right to be run over. Tap water is not potable unless boiled. Be aware of the porcelain trench, I never found a hotel that did not have a western style toilet in the lobby. Always have tissues, TP is not regularly provided.

Sep 3, 2004 09:13
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My adviuce would be that you make up your mind as to where to visit PRIOR to arriving, then stick to it! Three weeks is a terribly short time; I spent a whole month in KUNMING, and never tired of it! BUt then again, to each what they crave the most. Kunming wouldn't attract historical site hunters that much.

The distances are enormous, and buying train tickets will involve quite a bit of legwork and inordinate amounts of patience! Count on being stranded for a couple of days in each place you put on your itinerary, due to non-availability of tickets! This is especially to be reckoned with in touristy destinations such as Xi'an and Guilin.
Also: how are you going to travel? Are you willing to take the train? Choose hard-sleeper, if you want to get a maximum value for your foreign dollars: it's confortable enough, airconditioned, nonsmoking, yet you are among fellow travellers from the country you travel in. In soft sleeper compartments, you are the four of you in one compartment, and Chinese who can afford this kind of accom are usually a bit 'blase', as you can well imagine!
Avoid airlines!

Your first leg - from Peking to Xi'an would take approx. two days. It's a leisurely way of seeing northern China and its loess landscapes, grasslands, mountains and some industrial centres. If you want to visit a historically-relevant spot, plan on stopping over at LUOYANG, where one of China's first urban centres was built (though you won't see much of it, but it's kind of interresting).
In Xi'an, you should spend more thantwo days. Visit HUANGSHAN, 2120 kms away, scenic mountains.
Take a peek at Banpo village, 20 kms from Xi'an; you have heard of its terracotta warriors. Don't buy from those hawkers there!
Xi'an itself is a world away from "modern" China - the old wall is still there, palaces and temples are intact; museums galore, and worth a visit! There are lots of Muslims - enjoy their food!

I personally suggest a trip to nearby An'kang, some 300 kms to the south, past mountains, spread out on the bank of a small river that some 30 years ago swallowed the old town, hence a new wall had to be erected. The town itself is - or was, when I visited it - rather traditional, with lots of mosques too. There is a train station; trains come from Luoyang and go to Sichuan province. A bus ride from Xi'an is shorter, but still takes some 6 hours (unless the road has been improved dramatically).

Between Xi'an and Guilin is Jiuzhaigou; you need to take the train to Chengdu first. Plan on spending a couple of days in charming Chengdu! A tremendously interesting city full of local colours, yet decidedly modernist.
I don't know whether it's a good idea to visit Jiuzhaigou - in summer, it is horribly crowded, and in autumn it gets pretty old very quickly, and snowstorms come again. It's not a little dangerous too!

Sep 3, 2004 09:14
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Anyway, the trip from Chengdu to Guilin takes less than two days. I personally don't endorse Guilin but recommend YANGSHUO, which is 60 kms or less from Guilin. Once you have arrived there, you will understand my point...
It offers much the same, at a much more humane scale; Guilin is but a medium-sized town that's been spruced up over the past few years, but has little to show off except the famous landscapes hidden behind marble and steel towers and that crge you exorbitant admission fees. Hotels are decidedly expensive too. Yangshuo, on the other hand...

From Yangshuo, you will need to backtrack to Guilin, take a train to Shanghai. En route, I do recommend a visit to Qufu - a small town in traditional Chinese architecture where COnfucius was born 2500 years ago.

Bon voyage
Sep 7, 2004 17:08
#10  
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If your travel during 10.1 festival.
You have to pay much on hotel and airticket etc.
Probably 2 times than ordinary period.
what's more, many people everywhere.

If you plan to go to Jiu zhai,
I suggest you choosing lijiang of yunnan instead of yangshuo of guangxi.
there you can have chance to view scene of jokul,yak,meadow, beatiful lake all together. also can have chance to experice minority life.
The last matrilineal clan of world- mysterious lu gu lake.

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