Guizhou for May holiday week!

My friends and I will be heading to Guizhou for the May holiday week. Our tentative plans are to depart Shanghai (plane/train) on 29/4 (Sat) and be back in Shanghai by 7/5 (Sun) night, or at the very latest, early morning 8/5 (Mon).

1) What are your best recommendations for sightseeing in Guizhou?

1a) Ideally, we%26#39;d like to visit a Miao village, a Buyi village, a Shui village and a Dong village, without any repetition. I don%26#39;t mind missing out Buyi and Shui villages due to time constraints, especially if they%26#39;re not very photogenic... any opinions?

1b) We%26#39;d also like to see 1 waterfall, 1 group of caves and enjoy 1 rafting experience. I%26#39;ve thought about going for Huangguoshu Waterfall, Zhijin Caves (instead of Longgong Caves) and the rafting at Maling River Gorge... any opinions? I%26#39;ve heard that the Zhijin Caves are not very well-run... If visiting Huangguoshu Waterfall, I%26#39;d ideally leave it till the end of the holiday week when there should be less tourists there.

1c) It seems that northern Guizhou isn%26#39;t very interesting, so I%26#39;m skipping that. Any other recommendations for the rest of Guizhou will be welcome!

2) Apart from me, there should be about at least 4 other friends coming along. The number of people coming along could increase by quite a lot, but I%26#39;m not keen on having such a big group, due to logistics problems! It%26#39;s pretty hard to satisfy everyone in a big group, and also less freedom for everyone. If I had my way, I%26#39;d take only a maximum of 3 other friends, and that%26#39;s it. Any ideas on how to manage this? Especially since I don%26#39;t want to offend anyone by being rude...

3) Should we fly both ways, train both ways, or train and fly once each? I%26#39;m getting worried about the budget and time constraints! Train is cheaper, of course, but takes 33 hours each way; flying would be about 1500 RMB each way!

4) Any recommendations on where to hire a vehicle for 5-10 people? Driver recommendations will also be very welcome. Minivans seem to take a maximum of 9 people... :(

5) Any festivals during this period that%26#39;ll be worth seeing? As far as my research shows, there%26#39;re a number of festivals on 5/5 (Fri) as it%26#39;s the 4th day of the 4th lunar month.

6) Any recommendations for where to stay will also be very welcome! :) We%26#39;re on a student budget, so please, nothing too extravagant.

Thanks in advance to all for any advice offered. Happy travelling!

Guizhou for May holiday week!

Sorry, I don%26#39;t have much advice to offer as I haven%26#39;t been to Guizhou yet. But it is supposed to be one of the best places to go in China these days. I am sooo jealous. :)

Check out the WildChina website. They do a lot of really neat off-the-beaten track tours to Guizhou and their itineraries will no doubt give you some ideas. (I can%26#39;t afford those tours either--just look for inspiration.)

2) You%26#39;ve got to keep the group small. Maybe you can plan your trip so that it will cost too much and scare some people off or won%26#39;t fit everyone%26#39;s schedule...

3) Of course you should fly one way and take the train the other. Unless you really love these friends and want to spend 66 hours trapped in a 1.5 meter cubed space with them! You can fly both ways if you need to price some people at of the market if your group gets too big.

Guizhou for May holiday week!

Ellyse,

Tell me about your experiences with the ethhnic villages? Waht was set up and what was ineresting? And...the festivals?

I%26#39;m also planning a trip there in april/mai next.

Thank you,

Wim

Sorry, we actually didn%26#39;t see very much of the villages and were quite disappointed. I%26#39;d still recommend Xijiang though, but be prepared for very bad roads anywhere in southeast Guizhou province.

I am looking at taking some student from an American University to Guizhou. What advice to you have on places that we should visit, what are some projects that we could participate in, and what is the food like?

Tianxingqiao (Heavenly Star Bridge) near the famous Huangguoshu waterfall was my best experience of Guizhou. Clambering around (getting very lost in the process) Xijiang Miao village was a close 2nd, especially when we found the gorgeous rice terraces to the back of the village. Very worthwhile even despite stumbling upon (and having to escape headlong from) a funeral, TWICE!

Huangguoshu waterfall was actually quite disappointing as it%26#39;s expensive and not as spectacular nor as varied as the scenery at Tianxingqiao, and Tianxingqiao was also much cheaper. IIRC it was a difference of 90 RMB for Huangguoshu vs 30 RMB for Tianxingqiao!

Other places that we visited were the Zhijin caves, rafting at Maling river near Xingyi, Kaili, and Nanhua Miao village, plus passing by the outside of Langde Miao village.

Zhijin caves: interesting if you haven%26#39;t been to similar places before, but a bit boring otherwise. A lot of walking involved, and the limestone formations started looking all similar about half to two-thirds of the way through.

Rafting at Maling river near Xingyi: there%26#39;re 2 different sections, it%26#39;s not too bad if you find the right one, otherwise it%26#39;s going to be very boring. It%26#39;s not cheap either, plus it was very crowded and we had to wait for a few hours before being able to go. On hindsight, we felt it was too far to come all the way just for this. I think Xingyi is actually closer and easier to reach from Kunming in Yunnan province, than from the rest of Guizhou province.

Kaili: nothing too spectacular here.

Nanhua Miao village: very touristy! No qualms about missing it if you%26#39;re going to Xijiang or other villages in south-east Guizhou.

What do you mean by projects that you can participate in?

The food that we had was nothing to sing about, since we were eating at roadside places most of the time. We got horribly sick of stir-fried eggs after the 3rd day as we had that for every single meal, yucks. Too much of a good thing!

Be warned that the bill for eating at tourist spots like outside Huangguoshu waterfall is going to knock you out cold. We were charged %26gt;200 RMB for a scrawny chicken that was mostly bone! Our fault for not clarifying the price beforehand. Never ever order anything that%26#39;s ';special'; or ';local';. In fact, try not to eat anywhere near tourist spots.

Guizhou cuisine is mainly sour and spicy. One of the best-known dishes would be fish in sour-tasting soup (hotpot) with pickled vegetables.

I work with some professors and students that do international statistical projects that look at increasing tourism revenues. People have suggested that we go to Guizhou and do some projects to improve tourism there. We are just starting to research Guizhou. Last year we were in Shenzhen, so we are used to China.

Hmmm sorry, I don%26#39;t really have a clue of what you could do. :(

What would make a holiday to Guizhou better? How could your trip have been improved?

- More time, that%26#39;s for sure.

- And yes, more money!

- Should%26#39;ve arranged our transportation in another way. Getting ONE driver and vehicle for all of Guizhou is a bad idea, especially when the driver was as lousy as the one we had.

- Better accommodation. It wasn%26#39;t fun at all having 3 out of 4 of us (including myself) getting electric shocks from having an interrupted hot water shower.

- Knowing what sights to go for and what to drop.

- One major gripe was that I chose to trust a Miao girl for the arrangements for our last couple of days, and she totally failed us, very irresponsible. We were left with zilch arrangements for sightseeing, and no train tickets to get back to Shanghai. We had to get our own plane tickets back in the end.