Depending upon your time of life, your interest in organized travel, and your actual time budget, there are several different types of vacation that appeal to most visitors to China.
China itself as a country and culture is a tapestry that can go on for weeks and months of history surrounded by fairytale stronghold, temple, and mountain settings. To capture some of the glory before you plan your trip, it is actually worth watching Jackie Chan movies that are made about the era that is not modern so that you can enjoy some of China’s ancient and not-so-modern past.
Here are some China vacation type options that are the most popular for travelers from North America, Europe, and Australia:
Destination, transit, departure:
Let’s face it, China is a very large country. How many people say I’m going to the United States and I will visit Honolulu and New York City in one vacation? Not too many. When you visit China, you have some of the same size limitations. Some people choose to pick either North, West, or South to try and get a sense of culture as they move through a regional area.
To make this type of individualized tour, one should probably have a little experience traveling abroad without needing to rely upon resources or help from others. The key for most people is to have a landing point for your flight like Beijing, transportation that is booked that eventually takes you to your departure location. Shanghai or Hong Kong are popular second city choices, and then of course a flight back from your departure city.
You as the individual then fill in the blanks on the rest of the tour from the hotel booking, which can be done online, the sightseeing, and the day or side-tripping.
Organized tour:
One of the most accomplished companies for tourists in China has a history of putting together the most spectacular cultural heritage visits and then leaving a lot of free time around that so that people don’t actually feel like they are following a flag all the time. Of course there is that element of it, but you do get to enjoy some of the top sights in China as part of a group before going off on your own to see local points of interest.
You can also take advantage of a more organized tour in China that will account for every second of the time that you stay their. That type of curated experience in the tourism business appeals to a lot of people that want experts to provide them with advice about a culture as they experience it so that they do not miss any of the nuances.
Site-centric:
Some of the most popular places to visit in China are the palace complexes in Beijing, the Great Wall of China and the Outback in the Gobi Desert along the Mongolian frontier, the tomb in Xian containing the Terracotta Warrior Army, Shanghai, with its Bund and its new Chinese counterpart street along the waterfront, and Hong Kong and its bustling food, clothing, and electronics’ meccas.
If you take a site-centric vacation, you may just focus on spending all of your time in one city or region and take in everything that it has to offer culturally and historically. Because China has a very long history, you will be in good hands in most cases. You will also return with a much better picture of the individual region that you visited.
Taking a vacation in China can be exciting for many because it is one country that has an incredible history that hasn’t always been shared outside its borders. One of the most spectacular large temples was built without using any nails at all! After you decide to vacation there, finding the right type of tour or individual journey before you go will optimize your experience once you get there.