My wife, another couple, and I experienced a truly wonderful tour of China in the first half of June 2005. My wife and I lived in Korea and had visited Hong Kong twice but, at the time, mainland China was not open to tourism. Now that visits to China are easy and still inexpensive, we searched very hard for the perfect package which would take us every place we wanted to go. We found it in a ground/cruise package offered by Viking River Cruises (VRC), the 13 nights 'Imperial Jewels and Shopper's Paradise' tour!
We placed a deposit on the tour in October 2004, obtaining a $350 per person discount for reserving that early. At the same time, of course, we protected ourselves with comprehensive travel insurance for 'pretrip' and 'intrip' cancellations under a broad list of medical and other conditions. Luckily, nothing arose before or during our trip to bring the insurance into play. Our tour package included roundtrip coach airfare from Los Angeles via San Francisco to Beijing with return from Hong Kong and 10 nights accommodations in five star hotels and 3 nights aboard the VRC's 'Century Sky' as it cruised the Yangtze River. All meals, excluding lunches and dinners in Hong Kong, were included as were five flights inside China, all transfers, and the several 'extra' guided tours and excursions, sometimes many a day. We also chose the least expensive cabin option on the lowest passenger deck on the boat. The cost per person for the entire package - after the $350 per person discount - was $2829 per person plus $750 for roundtrip air from LA! We thought this a remarkably low cost for everything the package included and we still feel this way after the trip.
We will not praise United Airlines for the size of its seats in our 12 hours 'to and from' transPacific flights, though, but we were fed often in both flights and were able to watch three movies in each flight for those who could not sleep. UA's seats made that the probable case! Our extremely capable VRC guides who would be with us throughout the trip met us at the Beijing airport and, as they would do in every airport, hotel lobby, or the ship, assisted us in getting through the normal obstacles with the minimum confusion and delay. Throughout, they passed out boarding passes, got us quickly through airport security, issued hotel room keys, and had our buses waiting when and where they were supposed to be. They were very professional and we did very little waiting in this trip! They were also very candid about all aspects of Chinese life, often anticipating our questions but always ready to answer them, e.g., about politics, religion, poverty, and the national birth control policy.
I cannot describe everything we saw and did but, perhaps, a few highlights of the trip will provide a bit of flavor. We had two full days in Beijing and three nights in the Beijing Shangri-la Hotel, a very upscale hotel chain in Asia and the Pacific. Our trip and local guides escorted us to Tiananmen Square, through the Forbidden City, and for a bit of Beijing Opera after dinner. Of course, on our second day we enjoyed joining Chinese citizens and tourists from around the world in walking a stretch of the Great Wall.
We flew to Xian for one night in the city's Shangri-la Hotel and, the next morning, had a long tour of the sensational 2,200 years old Terra Cotta Warriors discovered in 1974. What an archeological marvel from the 750,000 craftsmen and peasants who toiled and died in their creation! After lunch, we flew to Chongqing in the center of the country to board VRC's 415 feet long, 168 crew/306 passengers 'Century Sky'. The ship was built in 2004 and was the largest and newest cruise boat on the Yangtze! Cruising the third longest river in the world, famous for its being the lifeblood of central China, was a thrill. We cruised the Lesser Three Gorges on a smaller boat, visited a wonderful pagoda ashore, and saw the dam under construction which will so change the Yangtze River basin. Our boat passed by the dam through a five level lock system, too. The food and service on the Century Sky were unbelievable, the equal of any cruise ship.
Disembarking the ship, we flew to Shanghai for three nights in the Westin Shanghai. We were escorted to the Children's Palace where we observed very young Chinese children being tutored in art, music, math, and computers so they can pass the nation's demanding placement examinations. What a delight - and I think the kids enjoyed our seeing the results of their work! We also attended the most remarkable acrobatic show one could imagine. Men threw each other and young girls high over the stage and one of the girls contorted her body incredibly while balancing spinning plates at the same time! We wandered the shops and boutiques of Nanjing Road and 'Old Shanghai' and saw older people's practicing tai chi, ballroom dancing, and kite flying along the famous Bund from which Europeans and Americans controlled much of China's economy over a hundred years ago.
We then flew to Guillin for one night in the Sheraton Guillin, the best hotel in town. In fact, the King of Belgium and his entourage arrived for a stay in the hotel only minutes after we did. The primary attraction of Guillin is the beautiful limestone karsts along the lush riverbanks of the Li River. The beauty of these outcrops is so impressive in a four hour river cruise and in the frequent mist and rain which moves through their peaks, is memoralized by many Chinese artists and is often a symbol of China.
Finally, we flew to Hong Kong for three nights in the Shangri-la Hong Kong with guided tours of Victoria Peak, Repulse Bay, and the floating 'junk' homes in Aberdeen. We had much more free time in Hong Kong and we were free to choose our own lunches and dinners. After so much Chinese food, a few of us dined Italian and German! The ladies loved the shopping and I had two custom tailored sports coats made in about 36 hours. Not unusual for the exceptional tailors of Hong Kong! It was encouraging that expressions of democracy persist in Hong Kong although it has been part of China since the summer of 1997.
We found the VRC's tour to be fantastic in giving us great insights into China - and at a great rate, too.
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