Trip Reports - Daytrip-HKG to Shenzhen, China

HKG is a very popular destination right now for mielage runs, especially with CO's $600 (or 25,000 OnePass miles) RT special. My daughter and I decided to make this trip to collect the boatload of bonus miles being offered, as well as to see a little bit of China. I will try to post a flight report in a few days. In the meantime, with many flyertalkers heading for HKG in the near future, I am posting this report and strongly urging a trip to "China for a day". It is relatively simple and fast. Here is how to do it.
In HKG, go to the Hung Hom Railroad station. Go to the ticket office and buy a roundtrip ticket to Lo Wu for about $60HKD. The trains run more or less like a subway, about every 5 minutes and it takes about 40 minutes to get to Lo Wu.
At Lo Wu, we ran into a situation where it appeared that several trains arrived at once and thousands of people appeared out of nowhere. They have a system of pens (like Disney World) for herding large masses like this, and it worked surprisingly well. The total time, including obtaining a Visa, to get into Shenzhen was under an hour.
Next,go through HKG emmigration. They will take the boarding card that you were issued when you entered HKG. Be sure that you are in the right line. 90% of the people will be in the line for HKG permanent residents. You should be in the line for "Visitors".
After passing thru the emmigration booth, follow the crowd across the bridge into the building on the Chnia side. Stay to your LEFT. You will see an escalator up to the second floor. Take it up, where you will see a Visa Office. In the right hand corner of the room will be a little machine that dispenses visa applications. Obtain one and fill it out and get in line. The offical will stamp your passport and hand it to the cashier whom you will pay $100HKD to for your 5 day visa to Shenzhen. Note that this visa is good only for Shenzhen Special Economic Zone. I you want to go to Gunagzhou, etc, you need a "regular" visa. IMPORTANT: After you obtain a visa, go to the immigration desk on the SAME SECOND FLOOR (The first floor immigration desks are for HKG permanent residents only). When you get to the room with the immigration desks, on your left will be a desk with entry papers. Obtain one and fill it out while you are waiting in line. The official will take it and stamp your passport and you are now in Shnezhen.
Exit the rail station and you will be on broad avenue that you can walk around past many hotels, restaruants, and stores (The Friendship Store is about 3 blocks down on your right). Most people, including Hong Kong permanent residents, go here to shop at the huge 5 story Lo Wu commercial center mall, a white building directly above the rail station. Be prepared to bargain and if you are a woman, to be badgered constantly to come into stores for a pedicure, manicure, shoes, and purses. This mall has got to have the most number of stores in the world selling pocketbooks and shoes. Gucci and Louis Vuitton are most common, with some Fendi, Channel, etc. Pretty much everyone sells the same thing so hard bargaining is a must. I was trying to impress this on my daughter when we came upon the perfect example. Two American women were bargaining with a shop owner for a Louis Vuitton shoulder bag, the smaller kind, rectangular that hangs perpindicular. My daughter said this would be about $175 in the US. They had initially agreed to a price of 65 RMB (The HKG dollar is similar and all shops prefer HKG dollars)- and yes, this is less than $10 US. They then could only "find" 50 RMB and 10 HKD and tried to get th shop person to tke this since they said (correctly) the the HKD was worth more. The shop keeper insisted on 65, so the women prepared to leave. As they got one foot out the door the price dropped to 50 RMB, when they got both feet out the door, it was 40, and finally, "you tell me what price you want to pay". This points up the fact perfectly that you will not get the best price until you say, "no thank you" and start to leave. At that point the pressure is back on the shop keeper to close the sale.
With many shops selling the same thing, the advantage is with the buyer. Incidentally, the quality varied substantially, and in no place more than China, the buyer must "beware". The Louis Vuitton I mentioned was an excellent item. It could have been a copy, a second, or fell off a truck. You need to carefully evaluate each item. If you do so, you will find a bunch of good items as well as bad items (As an example of bad, my daughter tried on a pair of $18 Nike sneakers. She said no thank you when she realized that there was basically no sole, and that she feld she was walking on a piece of cardboard. But they lookd nice http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif.
In order to return to HKG, you must do the following. Signage is not too good. You will exit China on the FIRST FLOOR (resist the temptation to follow the crowd up to the second floor, since this is for HKG Permanet Residents only). When you get to the emmigration room on the first floor, there will be a small machine on the side of the room that issues exit cards. Obtain one and fill it out while you wait in line. The offical will stamp your passport again and now you can walk back across the bridge into HKG. When you get to the immigration room, fill out the same kind of two part entry card that you did when you arrived in HKG. At the immigration desk, the officer will take the top copy and place the back copy back in your passport. This bercomes your exit card for when you leave HKG. Finally, follow the signs for the train back to Kowloon.
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The following is a link to my posting on the Continental Forum suggesting a ground itinerary for those on a mileage run with only 2 full days in HKG. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum20/HTML/002138.html
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Please feel free to e-mail me if anyone has qustions.
Ed


[This message has been edited by Vulcan (edited 03-20-2001).]

Great info! Thanks!

You mentioned that the visa you got was good only for Shenzhen. But how does that work? Aren't you free (more or less) to travel elsewhere in China once you're in Shenzhen? Or do you go through Immigration when you leave Shenzhen for other parts of China?

bp888
You are correct. In order to prevent an influx of "mainland" chinese into Shenzhen, you must go thru another "emmigration" post to get to the rest of China.

Shenzhen is a "Special Economic Region" thus having many benefits other places in Mainland China don't have. And without proper ID and approval China citizen cannot go into these regions. That way it works (if not changed since last time I travel beyond Shenzhen) is:

An outer border (Chinese people called it "Second line") is set up once you enter the area of "rural" Shenzhen, this normally can pass through by just showing the document while in the car. Then when you go into the "First Line" (more like urban) and you need to get off the car and showing the ID at counter. the check is for China citizen so if you have a foreign passport or are HK people again just pass through.

I think the special visa is issued under the authority of the Speical Economic Region only so not suitable to go beyond it. But... that is not that much to see beyond but near Shenzhen.

Vulcan, BTW have you go to the Chinese resaturant on the top floor (Laur?? Restaurant) ?

I also came back from HK (and Shenzen).

I wanted to take a tour through China Travel services, so I would not have the visa problems, so I went to the CTS office well in advance to inquire about the 2 day Guangzhou/Shenzen trip (My trip was 3 day HK/7day Japan/3 day HK/home).

I went to the office during my 1st HK leg. They took down my contact info and a copy of my passport, but wouldnt take down any payment information. I would have to go back to finalize.

After I got back from the Japan leg of my trip, I found out the Guanzhou/Shenzen trip was cancelled due to lack of interest by anyone else. Went back to the CTS office. Since I still wanted to go outside of HK, I booked the 1 day trip to Shenzen. Due to this being a tour, any visa issue is taken care of by the CTS office. They lost the original copy of my passport (glad they didnt need the original document) and I paid for the trip via AMEX. ( HK $700 total - or US $92 - just saw my cc statement online).

The trip itself was adequate. A bus picked us up from hotels, we drove through the New Territories, and arrived at HK emmigration. After about 45 minute wait in the bus (with dozens of other buses and empty trucks going into Shenzen) we got out, got in line with everyone else ( and there were hundreds )/ all to be repeated when we got back in the bus and went to Shenzen immigration.

Finally we get to the two Shenzen "attractions" - Splendid China and the China Cultural villages, both located nextdoor to each other across from the hotel we had lunch in. Splendid China was a large park of gardens and mini replicas of palaces and the great wall. The Cultural village was live demos of dances and the like from the hundred s of different cultures in China. The Cultural Village was the better of the 2.

The lunch was fair, and supposedly included 1 beer or soft drink each, but when the bill came to the tour organizers, extra drinks were included and had to be paid for by the indivduals who ordered them, since they werent ordered at the beginning of the meal. Since noone felt like arguing, these were paid for. The customer is apparently not always right in China.

We also were led into a pseudo-museum/government stor which was staffed by about 20 workers for the 15 people on our tour. They followed us as we looked at any item. Not conducive to buying anything.

Finally we had to go through customs on the China side and HK side again. As we got on our bus, a Chinese police followed us in and asked us all to hold up our passports as he inspected them.

An interesting side trip, but more interesting for the bureacracy/politics and poor business practices of the Chinese govt than for the view of a fantasy theme park,
where "we were allowed to take pictures". Very happy to be back in the US, with all its problems.

HK-UMICH:
Unfortunately, we passed by the Laurel restaurant on the 5th floor around lunch time and it looked very crowded with a line waiting to be seated. Because we wanted to see more of the mall and were not that hungry, we did not stop. I wish we had though. I promised myself that I will when I return with my wife (she is more insistent about not missing a meal http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif)