nikleb

Hi,

I am not sure if this is the right forum for my question. I am looking for some tips on how to organize a vacation to visit China. While I tend to prefer self organized vacations it seems that touring China is probably done best with an organized tour.
Does anyone have some tips in finding a tour?

Doc Savage

My parents booked a tour via Sinorama.ca last year and can't stop raving about how well they were treated for a reasonable price. They did Beijing, the wall, a Three Gorges cruise, bullet train, then a couple of days in Vietnam. You might check that company out. I may plan a trip with them myself later this year.

Safe travels!

Doc

JPDM

If you do not normally use tours, then there is no reason to do differently in China.
Tour, like the one mentioned above, are a cheap way to see China (as well as many shops).

jiejie

Agree with above--unless you are normally a group tour person and like to travel that way, China isn't the place to start doing so, since there are some significant specific downsides that come with mass market group touring in China.

If you want to try a self-organized trip (which can include periods of independence and periods of localized private guiding, in whatever proportions you want), then my first tips would be to identify:
1) Time of year options. Weather can be an issue. Avoidance of major Chinese holidays--the periods around Chinese New Year and October 1-8,--is a must.
2) Length of time in-country. Biggest newbie mistake is trying to see too much in too short a period of time. Suggest a 2-week minimum period, but we've given advice here for shorter and longer time frames.
3) Budget (if it's very tight). China is not as expensive as Japan or Korea, but not as inexpensive as Thailand or Vietnam. Most visitors to this forum tend to have enough budget that it's not a meaningful constraint on China trip planning, but if a backpacker budget, it's good to know since that affects location and transport choices.

After that, it's mostly about 4) Your interests--historical sights, village life, minorities, natural scenery, etc. Or a general balance suitable for a first-timer to get a variety of glimpses of China.

The most difficult part of planning a China trip is paring down the options to fit the time of year and time frame. Once that's done, executing the online bookings needed to form the "skeleton" of the trip plan is quite easy. Locating and booking vehicles/guides in places where it's deemed necessary, is not much more difficult. China is very much a "come as you are" kind of place and procuring resources on short notice, in real-time is actually more the rule rather than the exception.

Finally: language (or lack thereof) is usually overstated as a problem unless you are really off-the-beaten path. Plenty of foreign travelers with zero knowledge of Chinese travel independently or semi-independently every day in China and do just fine.

Clipper801

Sinorama went out of business a few days ago........


https://www.tico.ca/news/advisory/29...consumers.html

onuhistorian0116

moondog

Don't do a tour.

Hawes7701

JPDM

They did not exactly go out of business, they lost their travel agent license in some jurisdictions.

Clipper801

What is the difference? When the authority rescinded your licence, you are not "exactly go(ing) out of business"?

So in your opinion, they are still in business, just without a licence?

Which jurisdictions do they still have a licence to operate as a travel agency?

jiejie

Sinorama's own site says that they are out of business. https://www.sinoramaholidays.com/
This situation is causing a big mess with a lot of travelers right now. Hopefully, at least for those who booked their own flights to/from China, this will be the kick in the pants needed to just do some independent hotel and local guide bookings, in effect making their own DIY tour in order to salvage their holidays.

sushanna1

No need to take a tour. Depending upon what you want to see and where you want to visit, you can do just fine on your own.

worldiswide

No need to take a tour..also I don't find English speaking guides to be a good value either..get a good guidebook and try different modes of transport..subway train driver if need be for trying to cram a lot into a little tinne...tours spend a lot of time in factory stores where you don't want to buy and waiting for others.

Antonio8069

As others have stated, the bankruptcy of Sinorama has caused a major problem for many travelers.
Sinorama's business model required visitors to prepay $x,000 for the tour - which included airfare, hotels, local transfers and visas. I know of several folks who are out thousands of dollars. I have two related questions:
1. What is the role (if any?) of the China government? I am told that their pricing was so competitive because Sinorama had a preferred arrangement with China. Was this withdrawn?
2. Why is this issue not getting more attention? When airlines fail, its all over the news feeds. Isn't this comparable?

jiejie

1. What you were told is a complete lie. Unless you are a visiting diplomat, the Chinese government has no role, involvement, or sponsorship of these tour companies. Sinorama had private suppliers they used within China--most of them independent subcontractors--and a Yangtze boat company that was an affiliate though not exclusive to Sinorama customers . Sinorama's business model was to price their tours (at least their China tours) unrealistically low and then use fresh deposits from future customers, to cover the losses they were incurring on tours taken by current customers. A travel Ponzi, if you will. That eventually runs out of steam. When you lose money on every sale, making it up on volume--essentially what they were trying to do--only exacerbates the red ink. The Chinese government is guilty of all kinds of sins, but this isn't one of them.

2. In the travel press and even beyond, Sinorama's collapse got plenty of attention in the late July to early September period. Disposition of the company's remains are now in the hands of various liquidators/authorities, so new news has died down. Even though Sinorama was reasonably big by travel agent standards, we're still only talking a few thousand people (primarily Canada/US, Western Europe, Australia/NZ) that were affected, and many (most?) of those seemed to have either gotten their money refunded or that is in process. When airlines go under, usually a lot more people are directly affected and it's considered more press-worthy. There are way fewer airlines than tour companies, and it's simply more visible to the general, non-involved public and to regulators, when an airline bites the dust. The only reason Sinorama got the attention it did, was the scale of their malfeasance and the fact that they had done so much consumer marketing including (Canadian) celebrity endorsement and Groupon/Travelzoo/other discounter deals, that their name had become more familiar to more people.