Honeymoon in China

pernicitus

Hi all,
Looking for a bit of advice on China!

Myself and the (lovely) fiancé have decided (I was told) that we will be going to China next year for our honeymoon.

I am trying to decide whether to go by tour operator or would it be cheaper to go by booking all the individual flights, hotels etc. ourselves?
Now I understand that this is one of those kinda “how long is a rope?” questions, but any advice would be much appreciated.


We are looking to do a relative tour of China, understandably, China is a little bit bigger than Ireland and it may take a little more than 2 weeks to see all of China (or Ireland for that matter) ……. But we would like to see a few places and get a small feel of the country on our two week holiday.


The only two areas/Places we have on our must see (so far) are:
1. The great wall
2. Hong Kong

We were thinking of going in August 2011.
Has anyone booked using a travel agent, I looked and didn’t see too many? If so which one and how did you find the holiday?


We would be looking to spend €3000 - 4000(max) on the holiday, and also about €1000 spending money (pickup some electronics on the way back).

Are these figures viable? We are not too pushed about 9 star hotels and all in VIP treatment etc but it will be our honeymoon after all


Any help would be great
Thanks

ballsymchugh

definitely give yourselves a couple of days in macau too, it's an hour away by ferry from hong kong. i thought it was much better than hk too plus you have the world's highest bungy there!
you could add the terracota army in xian, and tiger leaping gorge (near leijang, which is a unesco heritage site) to the trip too if funds allow.

the great wall is done in day trips from beijing, all that can be organised with the local operators on tianemen square. china is a very cheap country as long as you don't get duped. if you're looking around and someone asks you to come and have a look at a student art display, or asks you if you want to visit a local tea house, reply in irish and they'll leave you alone. but they can be persistant and really bloody annoying. but if you go, you'll lose a fair amount of cash.
if you're a fast walker, you can see what beijing has to offer in 3 or 4 days.

the place to buy electronics is shenzhen which is over the border from hong kong. it's where apple have a lot their stuff made. if you organise the trip, you could fly to beijing, then to shenzhen, and walk over the border to hong kong without worrying about how many times you use the visa.

pernicitus

Hey Ballsy!
Nice one on the info, had a quick look at Macau and it looks really interesting, that’s the problem tho ! lol all the places look really cool. I think the bunjee is a defo!


The more I look at the package holidays, the less I want to go, talk about expensive!!!!!! I think we will have to take a serious look at a DIY China tour.



Besides some of the places to visit on the package holiays are of no interest to me, so it might be an option.


Nice one with the advice about “local places of interest”, I’ll have to brush up on my “Tá súile galánta gorm agam” replies. Lol


So in your opinion, how hard would it be to do all the organisation this end and still have a nice holiday, i.e. how reliable are the services etc, if I book a 5 star hotel in er hong kong and then turn up there, will they be like sorry sir, what hotel room?


It will be a honeymoon after all

Trampas

I stayed in the Hilton Beijing Wangfujing and it was around €80 a night

It is a great hotel.

http://www.tripadvisor.ie/Hotel_Review-g294212-d1146087-Reviews-Hilton_Beijing_Wangfujing-Beijing.html

I did a Kumuka tour when there.

It will be nearly impossible to see all the country in a month never mind a few weeks.

I was there for 3 weeks and really enjoyed it

ballsymchugh

i did a DIY holiday when i was there. flew to beijing for 4 days, then to north korea (which you probably won't do, but if you could, i'd highly advise - check www.koryotours.com, but it's all package holidays there). then i flew to kunming in the south west for a few days and did some hiking in tiger leaping gorge and hung around dali for a few days before going on to shenzhen, and then to hong kong and macau.

shenzhen is a hole of the highest order. there's nothing there apart from some enormous shopping centres selling absolutely everything really cheap, and really pushy pimps. when you walk out of the shopping centre beside the border you get men and women coming up to you telling you that they have 15 year olds for you, which is just creepy. tell them about your lovely blue eyes again!!

i spent longer in macau and thought it was so much better than hk. to be honest, the only thing that i thought was good in hk was victoria peak, and the skyline at night time, so that just took a day.
macau has some great sights, and it's casinos rake in more than las vegas, so if you go there, take give yourself at least 2 full days/3 nights.
as for the accommodation, i'm not the one to ask! i hosteled apart from macau where the rooms were very cheap.

Bacchus

Quick reply as I'm on my phone. Great choice of country. You'll have a great time.

2 weeks with that budget should be no problem. I spent a month in China and spent well under a grand. granted I was a cheap backpacker and the euro was stronger.

Beijing and the great wall are well... great and very easy to do.

Xi'an is the culture capital of China and has a lot of history to explore, if that's your thing. there's some great mountains to climb up near there too.

Since it is your honeymoon, I must recommend Hangzhou, near Shanghai. It is beautiful, relaxing and has loads to do. Shanghai itself may as well be any European city. Not knocking it but it's very French and not the "China" experience.

if you only went to one area in China, I'd say the Guilin area. Absolutely stunning scenery. Quite close to Hong Kong too.

solovely

Definitely agree with

if you only went to one area in China, I'd say the Guilin area. Absolutely stunning scenery

. We stayed in Yangshuo for a week - amazing! ANd well set up for tourism but still really cheap.

Transport around China is definitely the best in Asia. The trains are amazing, you have to go on one, just for the experience!

I imagine you will get much better value doing it independent, and packages and tours are usually full of much older people anyway so you'd be totally bored!!

Buy a Lonely Planet (but hide it when you go, as they are banned over there) and do lots of research. I know what you mean though, as soon as you start looking, you want to see everything, but Lonely Planet will give you some really good 2 week itineraries and tell you how to plan and organise them yourself.

Enjoy! It'll be fab!!

pernicitus

I think my minds been made up, We’ll be going DIY!

Hey Trampas! Nice hotel!!!! Hmmmm not sure if we can afford to stay in the likes of the Hilton every night but….. One or two nights would be nice

I googled Guilin, and holy God, if the views that we (hopefully) will see there, are only 10% as good as the ones that came up on google, it will be great! Thanks Bacchus and solovely for a great tip!
The main problem is that we will only have two weeks there, and the more I look at the country, the more I think we will need a several year honeymoon!!!


“shenzhen is a hole of the highest order.” LOL Maybe we’ll avoid there then….

Lonely planet is Banned!!! Good God! Will have to keep that in mind :eek:


The more I look, the more I can’t wait!
I’m trying to have the general areas down to 3-5 places for the 2 weeks, so the defo list so far is:

Beijing
Hong Kong
Guilin
We might be able to squash in one more area, but don’t really want to cram it too much.

Thanks to everyone for all the comments so far

Jacksquat

Hey, I`m in Guilin at the moment and I`d agree that it is definitely worth seeing.
Since you dont have much time I`d say one day in Guilin is enough to see the main attractions of the city and then take the Li River cruise to Yangshuo. This cruise is where you will see all those beautiful pictures that are so famous.

Spend a couple of days in Yangshuo, as said before its well set up for visitors and there are plenty of fine places to stay for any budget. I especially enjoyed going Cormorant fishing at night there, its good to watch!

The trains are great but with such a short trip you`ll probably be flying everywhere. The train from Beijing to Guilin takes 28 hours! Not worth your honeymoon time!

China is an amazing place, a completely different world. I`m sure you`ll love it!

Unwilling

Pernicitus - fantastic place China... loved it. And I didn't expect to!
We did a world trip last year... and did 10 days in China, it was only supposed to be 7 but we extended as much as our itinerary allowed.

We booked a GAP tour with Trailfinders - like you there were a few things WE HAD TO SEE and as our time was limited we figured this was the best way.

We didnt' regret it.

We saw, Beijing, The Great Wall, Terracota Warriors, water village. We ate with locals in their homes, we saw the great palace it was just spectacular.

Perhaps you can do this coupled with a few days independantly in the bigger cities - which are easy to navigate and worth while seeing.

ballsymchugh

the lonely planet isn't banned. every second person in the hostels had one. there's some handy walking tours in it. make sure to see the summer palace estate when you go to beijing too. and if you fly into beijing, only use the yellow cabs. there's plenty of guys there ready to fleece you by giving you a lift into the city.
shenzhen is a hole, but you mentioned that you wanted to get some electronics, and it's very good for that.

tobywon

We spent our honeymoon in China as well. Stayed in the Hotel Nikko in Honkg Kong, very reasonable and views of Victoria Harbour. We flew from there to Hainan, across the sea from Vietnam. Lovely spot.

pernicitus

Thanks to all that have given advice!

Sorry I didn't reply sooner, I was away on a business trip.

Thanks again for all the help,
Now all I have to do is start looking and booking