maestrolik said:
Hi thanks for the advice! Btw did you look for a land tour agency in Kunming and did you manage to go all the way to shangrila. I have 10 days to tour in Yunnan and should suffice for 3 places. the 400 bucks airfare includes taxes and 2 ways?
No, we arrange our tours and had some part time tour guides along the way. They charge different rates. If they think u are a chinaman, ur prices are likely to be a few times cheaper ( no joke). If they know u are from singapore, get ready to be chopped. The best is to be students from beijing university, or somewhere on the other side of china so they believe that ur funny and not so good chinese really belongs to china.
tics prices varies, so i suggest u chk it out
yeah..Shangri-la is called zhongdian by the way. It's a dusty place.
10 days is enuff.
Zhongdian got that song zhan ling shi, a replica of the tibetian monastery. You can take a 4 hours bus ride from lijiang to there. Along the way, u might stop over a rather scenic lake/river, i can't remember what is the name...but it's damn good to photograph, especially with yaks carrying passengers across the river.
In CHINA, look for a GOOD and cautious bus driver, preferably one WHO smokes. The roads are very dangerous and u want a driver who smokes so that he stays alert.
During spring time, there are horse races which can be exciting. There are some grassland plains etc, where they try to con you with stupid horse rides and exhorbitant entrace fees. Dun bother to go. Likelihood is some of them will invite u to a so call cultural show with so called authentic local yak meal etc. Again, dun bother to go. Another bunch of cheats.
There's also a baishu tai,( white limestone terrance) one of the only 2 in the world. Again. Dun bother to go. Entrace fees are high...and the scene, not worth it. Really only just trickle of water over some white ( and now badly corroded) limestone that's barely 50m².
Visit zhongdian only for the monastry. For meals, i really suggest u try out the local grills. Last time, i ate at this Dali Shaokao TWICE. Damn good, especially the beef and it's cheap.
Tiger leaping gorge is er, Ok. Deep gorges and muddy water. You can hike over the entire gorge for 3 days, lower, mid and higher gorge IF you dun mind looking at the same thing for 3 days. BTW, it's v dangerous if it's raining heavily.
Stop by lugu hu ( a lake ) if u can. It's VERY nice. Lovely billowy trees besides tranquil river...and it's free.
2 days lijiang, 2 day zhongdian, Tiger leaping gorge, take a car and cover it in 2 days. Go up north a bit and try to cover jiuzaigou ( which by now is also VERY toursity...at $$60 entrace)
and spend your last 2 days in chengdu before flying back.
