Originally Posted by
moondog
I think $3000 is a reasonable budget for you to strive towards. Apart from BJ and SH, cheap hotels are still quite cheap (figure $25/night). As for food, taxis, activities are concerned, I spend between y300 and y500 per day, but that's mostly in BJ and SH. It's not too hard to get by on half that when traveling out west, but since you are too people, maybe count on y300, or $45. So, that's 70*30, or $2100, leaving you $450 each for all of your internal flights/trains/buses. This is doable, but if you want to completely avoid hard seats and slow trains/buses, I'd advise you to earmark at least $600 for this purpose. Part of the problem is that Tibet is expensive to get to (btw, I am assuming there are easy/cheap ways to get Tibet permits now).
Agree, $3K is reasonable. Depends on how you hotel it (what brand/stars) as well as how you get around (flights/trains etc).
Given you're open to hostels and want to fly, my advice is book airfare earlier rather than later (surf the big airlines sites at least). Hotels you can wait longer, but utilize the same sites again (elong/ctrip) and perhaps secure your cheap bookings.
As moondog says, Tibet is your wildcard. It can be expensive and since you're essentially on a "tour" to go there, that tour can be expensive. My tip is to book your own hotels/food while in Lhasa and limit your trips outside Lhasa while in Tibet (e.g. trips to Everest Base camp are expensive, but worth it at the same time).
Prices are higher, but not that much higher. You can still eat on the street cheaply (if careful).
Have fun, China is still cheap and affordable by western standards!