Hi all, my spouse and I are planning a trip to china this year for vacation, in October. I was hoping to field some advice on where to go exactly, what to see, and general advice on navigating while only understanding English. What apps should I install on my phone for payment, translation, etc.
Rough plan currently is to fly into Hong Kong/stay for 1-2 days. Train to Shenzhen for 1-2 days. Train to Beijing 1-2 days. Then fly back.
Not sure exactly what we want to see, yet. For sure, the Great Wall. Also want to take a super fast train to Beijing.
Happy to hear all your thoughts, thanks!
you have to get a visa and it takes several months unless you pay for it to be expedited, which is very expensive. Start looking into applying now.
Depends where you’re from. A lot of countries even in the west have visa free holiday travel with China now.
yes that’s fair. I was basing this off my experience in US around 2019. I think this may also be an artificial thing because the process requires going to an embassy with your passport and the closest embassy for me was in CA so I had to send a third party service my passport and have them visit. The fee for a 2 week turnaround was paid to the company and was ≈$1500. I have no idea if any of that is actually part of the visa process or merely so they can gouge you if you don’t have 12 weeks to wait, which might also be an artificial time so that they can charge you.