Originally Posted by
greatwhitenorth
I'm going to monitor the direct flights to HKG for the next few days, as suggested, to see if any seats open up. After that, I'll try booking the flight through XMN. It is only 6 hrs traveling time and there are tickets available for CNY1120+290 tax/fees.
Just out of idle curiosity, why are there so many flights to HKG connecting through PVG and only 2 direct flights? I can't imagine why it's even an option, when it's only 300 miles to HKG from KWL but PVG is 800 miles each way from KWL. Mind you, if you're planning a mileage run, who'd complain
Thanks again for the help.
Like moondog says, just as huge a hassle doing connecting flights in China. A lot of times, bags cannot be transferred and you are required to check-in again at your connecting airport. Not to mention, PVG/SHA-HKG flights are often delayed, as the airways are congested between the cities.
And to answer your question, simply there's no demand for KWL-HKG. Guilin is a tourist attraction, not a major industrial or financial base. It's not even the capital of Guanxi Province, one of the poorer and less industrialised in all of China. So, no business trips, and also no wealthy Chinese from Guilin coming to Hong Kong for shopping trips.
Add to that Guilin is an old tourist place for Hong Kongers. I'll say probably most locals who have a "Homeland Return Permit" has visited Guilin and it's not a place one needs to visit and visit again. And for the budget travellers in Hong Kong, cheap tour groups will use buses to get from Hong Kong, and not by plane. Other budget travellers from Hong Kong (on photo-club trips, or volunteering work in the poor rural areas, or visiting relatives) will fly from SZX, poor timing flight or otherwise.
So, those two flights are enough to satisfy the few foreign tourists who decide to make Guilin and Hong Kong on the same trip, or the few relatively wealthy Hong Kongers who want to visit Guilin/Yangshuo for the 20th time, or the few wealthy Guiliners who decide to come to HK for some LV bags.
On the other hand, who are the majority of tourists in Guilin? They are the newly wealthy Chinese from coastal cities. Like Shanghai or Hangzhou or Nanjing or Suzhou, and so on... Not Canadians or Hong Kongers or Japanese. And Shanghai itself has population many times that of Hong Kong, with plenty of them still haven't got their pictures taken in Guilin.
And if you look at flights between HKG and China, most cities only get a few flights a day, except Beijing and Shanghai. Even Kunming - capital of Yunnan, a province with vastly more interesting attractions than Guangxi - only gets three. And Chengdu, one of the largest cities in China and most important in Southwest China - gets five and that's it.