About when is that in terms of Beijing (I've found some very attractive FF tickets to China for next year). Is the pollution in Shanghai as bad as it is in Beijing? I'm thinking about a special occasion (anniversary/birthday) trip in early September. Nothing too adventurous (although the countryside may be less adventurous these days than Beijing on a "bad hair day").

My husband and I don't have any special respiratory problems. But we are seniors - and perhaps have to be more cautious than other people. Even if the pollution won't "kill us" (and I'm sure my smoking will kill me before a week or two in China) - I'm just afraid bad air pollution may slow us down in terms of our ability to explore. We like to walk - and poke around - and don't have as much energy as we used to.

Some younger residents of our HOA went to China in the late fall of last year - and posted pictures of their trip. The pollution looked kind of bad - and they were wearing face masks.

Also - in early September - would the weather be super hot? We're ok with hot (we live in Florida) - as long as no one minds our wearing shorts and comfy shirts. But temps in the high 80's or higher are hard for us in big cities (we were in Tokyo last year in early September - and temps like that there really slowed us down a lot).

We'd really like to visit China before we're too old to do so - but not if the trip winds up being a forced march through unpleasant conditions (the super long air trip is bad enough!). Robyn

September is a great month to visit Beijing. But in 2014 the dates of sept. 6-7-8 are a holiday weekend, Ok, if you like crowds...

Early Sept. in Shanghai will be as tropical as Tokyo was.

Nobody can give you any guarantees on the pollution conditions or trends for a specific month anymore and particularly not for Beijing but if you had to gamble on a month, September is as good as any and the weather is usually very pleasant. September in Shanghai is going to be roughly comparable to Jacksonville in avg temperature and humidity though cooler in the last half of the month. Assuming a trip of 2-3 weeks, consider starting in Beijing with arrival around September 10 (after the mid-Autumn holiday) and working your way south perhaps ending Shanghai or Hong Kong for flight home. You definitely want to exit China by around September 28 when the run up to a big national holiday week kicks in. If you are OK with cooler weather and particularly in Beijing/Xi'an, then postpone arrival until October 10 or so. Though Beijing and some other cities have many iffy days of pollution, there are some parts of China and places to visit that have relatively better air that shouldn't cause you issues, and maybe putting some of those in your trip would help.

Will be in China Nov 21- Dec 1 (Beijing, Shanghai, Xian, Suzhou and Hangzhou). What would be the pollution around that time considering its cold..

Thanks for the information. Seems like no time is perfect. So I just picked the days with the best FF tickets and better chances for good weather. Arriving in Beijing on 9/24 and departing Shanghai on 10/7. That does put us in China for Golden Week - and we will just work around it in terms of our scheduling. Figure out what things to avoid - and avoid them. Note that we plan to stay in 2 - max 3 places. Robyn

517 in Shanghai now: http://aqicn.org/city/shanghai/luwanshizhuanfuxiao/

Is pollution in shanghai getting worse?
Went there often but stopped going since last year n i dont recall shanghai having bad air pollution.

I wouldn't jump to this conclusion. Nearly all midsize+ cities in China are subject to hideous pollution whenever stagnant air weather patterns are present.

was told by a reliable person about the BJ pollution sources; 1/3 from vehicles, 1/3 from construction, & 1/3 from coal. Now this is an average & BJ has 5 million vehicles, the construction in BJ is about the same as all of Euorpe, and coal is needed to produce heat & power for the city of 23 million people.

Thus, wind is needed to move the pollution out.

It appears that it isn't just Beijing now. Friends in Ningbo, Nanjing and Shanghai have all wechatted photos from this week that show a heavy fog like they were in SF.

Read about the pollution in the news.. Am going to be flying in tomorrow and departing the day after.

Hope this doesn't affect my travel plans. Any thing that I should be mindful of?

Yeah, this sounds bad. Hope it clears up and doesn't cause PVG to backlog.

Does this mean we should be avoiding sightseeing outside?

The underlying causes honestly haven't changed much (for better or for worse) during recent years. It's all about the weather.

Just be on the lookout for these: http://i.imgur.com/mKnI5tn.jpg

If u plan on sightseeing, bring along some n95 type face masks from home. They are light and easily carried.
Otherwise, it would be like breathing in smoke all day.