Recommended Tour Operator to China?
 

Hello everyone,

I have searched rather extensively online and also on FT for advice on recommended tour companies to China, and have not found many leads besides luxury tour companies such as Abercrombie and Kent, which are out of my price range (starts at $3300+). I am especially lost as to which tour company to go with, because I've read many negative things about tour companies to China, with their required shopping trips, tendency to bring travelers to Westernized restaurants, and required tips. I honestly am anti-tour, and would love to see China on my own, but my parents are adamant on going on a tour.

In my research, there were a few companies -- China Odyssey Tours and China Highlights -- that did stand out as you are given a private guide, but I haven't heard of them beyond their own website.

I would greatly appreciate any leads to a recommended, reputable tour company to China. Thank you!

Take a look at:
http://www.chinafocustravel.com/

I'm pretty sure this is the company friends of mine in Concord just did a tour with from SFO, and it was recommended by friends of theirs that also used them. They were particularly happy with the quality of hotels (4-5* from what they described to me). I'll try to find out which tour they took and update here.

edited to add: They did the 12 day tour, which may be the same as the 11 day tour in 2008. It was with China Focus.

Hi Tom,

Thanks so much for the link! If you could find out which tour they took, that would be great. My parents and I would like to visit Beijing and Shanghai for sure, while X'ian and towns such as Suzhou and Guilin would be nice but not mandatory. Thanks again!

I did a tour a while back. The meals were all at tourist restaurants (along with some "mandatory" side trips to Chinese medicine, knick knack shops). My son and I stopped going to the restaurants (unless we were in the middle of no where). We had a Lonely Planet and ate at restaurants recommended in the guide. We actually got off the bus and took a taxi back to town from one of the stops. I don't know if China is getting any better at this. Of course, we are veterans at escaping from the tours. At the time China was just moving from required guided travel.

Thanks for the info, Manneca!

Last year I was in the same position that you are in now.....which tour company among the thousands. I did a lot of research and picked one: http://www.interlakechinatours.com. I would highly recommend getting in touch with them as I found them very knowledgeable. Due to limited time, we took the Beijing, X'ian, Shanghai tour - which by the way was custom fit to our liking (ie days and specific places to see along the way). We had a guide every day, good selection of hotels, meals, and great transportation provided for us. This was not a tour group but tailored for only two people! It was probably the best orchestrated tour I have ever been on, and like you I am not a fan of tour groups! The tour guides are hand selected by Interlake and are very keen on their ability to avoid crowds and the tourist traps.

Enjoy your trip! Hope this helps

We used chinahighlights and we were very impressed.

They were a little bit more expensive than the other guides but the guides we had were reasonable english speakers.

We used them to go down the Yangtze River to visit the Three Gorge Dam.

Can't give them enough praise and commendation. This was September 2007.

I have same question as OP. Friends have recommended Explorient and RCrusoe. I looked at the Interlake site. I am not trying to cut corners but am looking for value. Have been to Beijing and Shanghai so those aren't high on the list. Interested in Xian, Chengdu, Guilin, Lhasa, and Silk Road along with extensions to Katmandu and Mongolia. Any recommendations for companies that might be good keeping it to around $300 per person per diem?

thanks,
Marc

I'm a US expat who's lived in Beijing for years. When my elderly parents came over to visit a couple of years ago, I set up a private tour for them (for 19 post-Beijing days) with Success China Tours (www.successchinatours.com). Parents--who are fairly experienced travellers and not group-tour types, were extremely pleased with everything, and they have exacting standards for quality English-speaking guides. SCT also offers "join-in" group tours on set dates as well as custom private arrangements. This company used to be, and I think still is, the China on-the-ground agent who does the arrangements for 3 very expensive and well-known North American tour retailers, but if you contact them and deal with them directly, their pricing is very reasonable for the value you get. It will be competitive with prepackaged large group tours sold in USA/Canada. For custom tours, they will use hotels of the quality you want--either 3, 4, or 5*. Being in Beijing, I was able to check out their offices directly and meet the owner Mark Yu to confirm it was on the up-and-up. I think they do international pre-payments by bank wire, which is pretty typical. With this or any other company who set up an independent tour, you MUST be very clear on your requirements for hotels, knowledgeability of guides, inclusion or exclusion of shopping time, meals, etc. With a prepackaged tour, you don't have choices or much flexibility, but this may be OK if you don't mind larger groups and your itinerary is on the typical tourist route.

Dining Experience?
 

Jie Jie,
Did your parents happen to allow Success China Tours arrange restaurants during their tour? The have a culinary tour with set restaurants and wanted a review of their picks. Mostly concerned with the dinner choices as we realize you have to take what you can get while on the road touring.
Any insights are appreciated.
Thanks:)

Happy, my parents did a mix, but generally skewed to NOT including most meals in the base price (except breakfast, which is generally included in most hotel rates). And I think I specified I wanted the famous dumpling dinner and the Tang Dynasty dinner show included for them on two successive evenings in Xi'an, but other than that, for lunch and dinners they just did it on the spur of the moment, based on whatever they felt like. During days where they had a local guide, the guide usually just asked what they were interested in and then took them to a decent local restaurant and they ordered whatever sounded good. They'd pay on the spot for themselves and guide, but it's so cheap to eat local in China that you come out better than if you include it in a base price. On their free days without guide, such as in Shanghai, they found their own and sometimes did Western for a break. My parents like Chinese food (the real thing, not the Westernized crap that is Pretend Chinese), so they never had any trouble finding a place to eat. I did give them a survival/health pack of several sets of clean, prepackaged disposable chopsticks and plastic forks/spoons. Those came in handy on the few locations where they were off the beaten path and the local restaurant cutlery was nondisposable and washing was suspect.

At any given mealtime, half of China is cooking and the other half is eating. A good meal, no matter how humble, is serious business here, so you certainly won't starve! I still prefer an as-you-go approach to eating rather than a pre-set restaurant tour. For instance, on the SCT culinary tour you mention, they use Quanjude Beijing Duck (most of the foreign-oriented tours use Quanjude) which is in all tourist guidebooks as the most historic/famous/etc. Any Beijinger worth their salt would tell you go to Dadong or Liqun or even other locations for a better, cheaper duck! It's not that Quanjude is bad, it's OK if you don't have a better yardstick by which to measure. And most of these culinary tours end up at famous, overpriced, decent restaurants but you can always do better for less. My best meals in China have been at local restaurants that may not be featured in foreign guidebooks, but are popular with locals and generally cheaper to boot. And my taste in Chinese food runs to homestyle cooking rather than banquet, formal, and specialty setups. I'd recommend setting up an itinerary, and then asking on travel boards for various recommendations in your planned stops. Unless you despise Chinese food in all its permutations, or are a strict vegetarian, eating is just not something to stress about on a China trip.

Thanks for the insights! I'm more of an off the beaten track eater too - but our group currently has over 30 people. Do you think we'd be able to make 'on the fly' reservations for such a large group?
Thanks again for your help.^

Happy, you didn't mention you had 30 people! If you want them to stay together, you need to make prearrangements with restaurants in advance. Unfortunately, groups this large tend to get fairly lackluster to downright bad meals, as the dishes are all preordered (or selected by the restaurant) to save time, and aren't necessarily what the group would select if left on their own. Often, they are made to maximize profit for the tour company, who gives the restaurant a fixed price/head for the group and the restaurant has to come up with a way to feed the group and still make money. A recipe for cutting corners. I think there are three ways to handle meals for a large touring group, and still have a shot at getting great meals. Each method has its pros and cons:
1) Have the tour company select restaurants that can handle this size group and reserve tables only, but no preset menus (except maybe for specialities like the Duck Dinner, the Dumpling Dinner, etc). Add an extra 30 minutes allotted for each meal time to allow for ordering on the spot. Local guide will advise and facilitate the dishes ordered. These meals could either be included in overall tour price, or collect a per person assessment at meal time or just prior/after. Choice of method may depend on nature of the group. In Xi'an I once had to rescramble a transport-disrupted tour schedule and feed 24 people at a local restaurant (with me and local agent selecting the dishes), a MEMORABLE meal of 10 different dishes for RMB 20 per person. (US$ 3.00), everyone chipped in when the bill came.
2) Make the tour company get menus from their preselected restaurants in advance, and YOU go over the menus and help them preorder what you think best suits your group. Tour company will adjust their overall per person tour price based on this. This takes more upfront preplanning time, and many tour companies don't want you to see menus with prices, as it tips you off to their profit margin. Preordering will save time, but doesn't guarantee the cooking itself won't be done in advance.
3) Particularly for dinners, split the group up into 6-10 people and go to different places, preferably with at least one local guide (or Chinese speaker) to go with each group to help out with logistics and ordering the dishes. This sometimes ends up happening ad hoc on big tours anyway. Chinese restaurants can always handle a group of 6 walk-ins, and usually even 10 people at one or two tables. I would definitely not include these types of situations in the prepaid base price.

Maybe "mix up" the methods on the tour. Just be clear with the participants what the plan is when they sign up. For most Chinese restaurants (except for the fanciest places in the bigger cities), a good rule of thumb cost per person (for food only, excluding drinks) is RMB 30-40 at a local homestyle type place, RMB 50-70 at a mid-range place, and RMB 100+ at the more famous restaurants. Beijing and Shanghai will be more at the upper 2 levels. Fancy seafood and exotica will be more. Lunches or lighter meals will be towards the lower end of this scale. It is of course, possible to pay lots more, but you really have to work at it. Western food will cost more. Fast food (KFC, etc, in case anybody gets the urge) is every bit as much as USA if not somewhat more. Figure RMB 7 = 1 USD, the way the dollar is sinking.

My quick 2 cents, I would skip tour groups altogether. Let me know how much time you have and PM me, and I'll be more than happy to give you an itinerary with tips regarding food and everything. No Chinese needed (though I speak on the intermediate-ish level).

jiejie - thanks for the insights and tips, will discuss with the group.
Jamoldo - thanks for the offer - but with over 30 people I think I need the logistical support of a tour company for transportation at the very least. Can't see trying to coral everyone from hotel to site in six or seven taxis! Might PM you for some restaurant suggestions.

Thanks again! I just love FT!^