mosburger

Planning to fly CX to HK, then acclimatize and visit friends in Shenzhen for a few days and onto the Beijing bound HSR train in Guangzhou.

China has a wonderful rail infrastructure second to none, make use of it!

moondog

You can actually start at shenzhen north, but I honestly don't see any pointt in taking a train on that route apart from simply liking trains. Flying is faster 99% of the time and usually cheaper.

sniles

My TSN-SHA flight was delayed 45 minutes yesterday. Straightforward reason given by airline personnel was "military exercises leading to Shanghai's airspace being closed".

BuildingMyBento

The trains are ok, but everything else about the experience - HSR and the 普通s - is irksome.

I "had the opportunity" to line up at various Hunan train stations recently. It occurred to me that, if the city also had an hsr station, buying a ticket at those was a slightly better choice.

Though, the newer stations are rarely located anywhere useful - for now - so the time spent getting to one is another issue. In this case, I feel like hsr users often get Ryanair'd.

mosburger

Why don't you buy tickets at the railway ticket kiosks or travel agencies if not online?

And yes, the stations are built at city fringes but the speed and comfort on board makes up for that.

moondog

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. And, the food smells (in those airtight train cars) place a big dent in the comfort argument no matter how convenient the schedule.

************
I'd like to make a few comments that are relevant to the original topic:

1) My feisty business partner has been putting me through hell today with respect to travel advice, which he normally appreciates. To my credit, I was able to give him a heads up about the fact that his 1p flight had been cancelled when he was about to head off to the airport at 1030a (neither ctrip nor CZ were reporting this little tidbit). Ctrip then gave him an opportunity to choose an alternate flight, and we decided to go with the 305p CZ departure (in favor of the 330p MU flight) because it was showing on time, and its record on flightaware is about as solid as it gets (though still pathetic). In any event, now that it's showing a 100 minute delay (estimated), he's been pestering me about why I didn't advise him to go with the 8p flight instead. Fair point because I suppose he wouldn't have had to waste a Saturday at the airport, but it's honestly a random walk (I'm not sure whether or not wasting a day at an airport is better/worse than arriving home at 330a).

2) Both the cancellations and extended delays during this time frame are very real. The good news about the cancellations is that: a) they aren't being made on the fly; and b) there seems to be ample capacity on alternate flights in most cases... presumably because this topic has been covered extensively in the CHINA DAILY (see point #3), which has had a profound effect on the public's desire to fly.

3) The official news coverage this topic has received is a first, to the extent that I'm not really sure what to make of it. Basically, it's common knowledge that the PLA likes to make its power over the skies known at times. However, the government mouthpieces generally steer clear from the issue. In this case, they have reported it like it is, and comments about ensuing economic damage have not been censored.

Reading between the lines, this seems to be a tacit attempt for Beijing to call out the PLA on its behavior without resorting to more confrontational means.

percysmith

Today seems to be a bad day too - 18 hkg-pvg flights delayed over 100 mins and 3 cancelled.

moondog

Yes, it appears that there was effectively a wall between the PRD and Shanghai in place for a solid 3 hours this afternoon, and for several one hour periods before and after. But, I wonder why the HKG/MFM flights aren't filing over-water flight plans (not an easy option for domestic flights) that enter Chinese airspace to the east of Shanghai.

In any case, for those of you flying to Shanghai, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Wenzhou, Ningbo from the south or west during the course of the current "campaign", consider postponing those trips, but if you must take them, pay Y20 for the travel insurance after verifying that it includes compensation for delays of more than 3 hours.

My (aforementioned) business partner's flight ended up arriving 4.5 hours late (6.5 hours late if we go by his flight that was cancelled, which would be the appropriate "clock" to use if he had rebooked at the airport instead of in advance). He's no longer bitter because he now accepts the fact that hundreds of thousands of people face the exact same plight, and when the airlines tell us they have no idea when the flights are going to leave, they aren't lying.

Taiwaned

Well, tomorrow I am doing the WZN to PVG, PVG to KIX flights.

Good thing is, its first thing in the morning and we purchased the tickets via Ctrip. We do plan to purchase the insurance once we get to the airport.

We are more worried about our luggage getting lost than the varioius waits we will be forced to endure.

percysmith

Do they have an over-water option? Never experienced it, I don't think hkg-PRC flights get this option.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/hong-...around-hk.html

rkkwan

Today's just as bad if not worse. It's 630p right now and so far for HKG-PVG:

KA has cancelled two flights, but last KA/CX flight that had departed gate was originally scheduled at 1:55p and departed 3:26p. Nothing had gone out since.

Over on MU, last flight that had departed was scheduled 12:50p and departed 4:20p. Nothing since.

Many flights don't even have an estimated time for departure.

NotHamSarnie

I had my PVG-SGN direct flight + return canceled last week. I have a feeling it's more because of Sino-Vietnamese relations than anything else. Anyway, I was about to cancel the whole trip ex-US because I couldn't fulfill the 72-hr no-visa conditions without the direct flight. Then it occurred to me that I can go from PVG to KUL with MH and then to SGN (also with MH) the next day and still be ok. So I'd be doing:

US -> PVG -> KUL -> SGN -> KUL -> PVG -> US

Does anyone see an issue with this, keeping in mind I've built in huge time cushion ex-PVG to account for the delays/cancellations that are the subject of this thread.

NotHamSarnie

Last time I was there (2013) you couldn't buy the tickets at the HSR kiosks without a Chinese ID card to swipe. Infuriating.

moondog

I don't have the MOR card that is issued to people who don't have Chinese IDs, but some friends of mine do, and it works like a charm (it was introduced within 2 months of the ticket machines going live).

moondog

No matter how long your SHA-KUL is delayed, you'll still be in compliance with visa free transit, but I question the sanity of your plan in the general sense (3+ hour delays in each direction are a very real possibility). You might want to consider popping over to Jeju or some random Spring Airlines destination in Japan instead (Shanghai has not been blocked off from the east).