Hi,
i am new in this forum. My name is christian, I am living in austria and travelled a lot in south east asia on my own. In china I only was once in Beijing (and hongkong, when it was british).
I am planing a trip to yunnan.(3 travellers) First part is:

- Oct/14 in kunming airport, take flight to Shangri La.

- Oct/15: visit monastery and town
- Oct/16: go by bus to baishuitai (visit white water terrace) arrange pick up to Tiger Leaping Gorge, overnight
- Oct/17 make a few hours trek in Tiger Leaping Gorge
- Oct/18 go by car/taxi to Shigu (Yangste gulf) and to Lijiang.
- Oct/19 Lijiang, sightseeing
- Oct/20 Lijiang, afternoon bus to Shaxi
- Oct/21 Shaxi, friday market and visit Shibaoshan
- Oct/22 Shaxi - Minibus to Yangbi and Xiaguan/Dali.
- Oct/23 Dali - sightseeing
- Oct/24 Dali, Shaping Monday market? + Xizhou
- Oct/25 Dali, take overnight train to Kunming
- Oct/26 Kunming, to be continued

What are you thinking about this itinerary? Is it doable? To stressful?
Please let me know your impression

Hi Christian,

Your itinerary is the old well trotten tourist trail through Yunnan. Join the thousands of tourist doing exactly the same thing. And like all others you plan to do it all too fast. Typically one of these "been there, seen that" tick it of your bucket list tours.
Is it doable? Yes with luck and if you speak a bit Chinese (Needed to go with public transport).
Is it stressful? Very much so.

PS:
Shigu (Yangste gulf). You seem to have copied this from Google maps or so which has more funny translations. The place is called "The first bend of the Yangtze" (Which is called Jinsha here). Only Chinese are interested in bends in rivers and will go there. There is absolutely nothing to see but indeed a bend in a river.

Hi lemon lover,

first of all, thank you very much for your post. I shall think about my itinerary. Your input is much appreciated. We do not speak chinese at all, but are experienced travellers.
May I ask you, how you would plan it, if you do not know these desinations? How long would you stay in each city/area?. What would you skip (bend of Jinsa, o.k. but this is only a few hours when driving from TLG to Lijiang) We have all together about 3 weeks, but I also would like to include Shilin, yuanyang terrace, Yianshui and Dongchuan red land in second part of the journey.
Any input is welcome...
By the way, if somebody is interested in my journeys in last time, see: www.youtube.com/user/christian4870/videos

Looks like you've made some enjoyable trips. I watched some of the video on the North of Laos - by the way, much of the soundtrack music you have used for it is Chinese, not Lao.
Note that the central area of Lijiang is rather horribly touristic - you might choose to spend a little more time in the area and get away from the high concentration of KFC/horse-ride-for-the-kiddies/bars etc. that you will find in the center ("Old Town").

Hi Alien,
thank you, i am travelling more than 40 years 2 times a year for some weeks..I like travelling backpackerstyle..
Thank you for tipp for Lijiang...

You could cut away the Lijiang noise (and the Yangtze bend mentioned) from the itinerary and change it to Weishan, Nuodeng or Xiangyun (with Shuimu Mountain) after Dali. Or some similar thing. Basically you could head straight from Tiger Leaping down towards Shaxi. Lijiang is a headache, but Tiger Leaping is absolutely worth it anyway.

Sure there are differing opinions but I think most would agree that Weishan, Nuodeng or Xiangyun would stand ahead Lijiang. Yea, and Xiangyun you will not hear much about, but thats what make it worth.

Hi Christian,

In general your itinerary is the old fashion tourist trail. Once up on a time that was the thing to do. Now it is a slow moving cue of tourist. Things have changed enormously and they keep on changing.

Shangri-La: Even the name was invented to attack tourists.
Songzanlin Lamasery. Is interesting but sometimes the place is deserted and has a strange atmosphere.

Shangri-La old town: Burned down some years ago and has been rebuild in Han style.

Baishuitai: Apart from the locals that try to rip you off quite OK.

Tiger Leaping Gorge: Up to 5000 tourists every day on a day trip from Lijiang.
Hiking. Takes days and not a few hours.

First bend of the Yangtze: Not worth the effort. Chinese look from a distance from the watch towers build at tourist stops on the route between TLG and Lijiang.

Lijiang: Overpriced and overrated. The last Naxi has gone and is now run like a giant shopping centre by some Han tourist corporations.

Shaxi: Go there before it is too late. Recently build Landscape hotel will attract hoards of western tourist. They are enlarging the road to it to accommodate tour busses.

Shibaoshan: Spend a week there ;-)

The only place really worse going.

Yangbi: Forgotten by the tourist. Visit the old iron chain bridge and the old mosque.

Dali: Main streets are one big shopping experience. Go off the main road and it is worth it. Do try the Bad Monkey beer.

Shaping: Is history. Once this place was only accessible by boat across the lake and on foot from the surrounding mountains. Now there is a big new road shocked with thousands of tourist. The market was old fashion; farmers bringing in their products and traders exchanging them for industrial goods. Now only tourist crab for sale.

Shilin: 4,000,000 visitors per year That is 11,000 a day. If you really have to go then go to the Naigu Stone Forest which sees only a hand full.

Yuanyang Hani terraces: Great but the wrong time of the year.

Yuanshui: No problem but not that special.

Red Earth: Great but again the wrong time of the year.

Again your itinerary looks like a bucket list to tick off. Well if that is what you want go ahead. If you want to see Yunnan do something else.

Good luck!

Almost a cruel and cynical, but anyway quite a realistic view from lemonlover. The story on Shaping brought good memories.

What you think of Nuodeng, lemon?

Great Ham !!!

The itinerary is a bit too packed.

I would suggest considering skipping Lijiang entirely.

You see the first bend of the Yangtse when you get the bus from the western end of Tiger Leaping Gorge (Qiaotou) up to Jianchuan or Shaxi anyway. It's quite spectacular topography but not a destination in and of itself.

You may be better served by visiting Baishuitai then immediately being driven through Haba to the eastern end of Tiger Leaping Gorge so you are ready to start walking in the next morning, since there is really not a lot to see at Baishuitai except for the forest above which is a very high very long climb. This could be achieved by arranging a private car from Zhongdian (Xianggelila) to take you there and drive back empty. However, if you like forests, I highly recommend the mountains above Baishuitai - the best high altitude forest I've yet seen in Yunnan.

The valley of Shaxi itself can be seen from Shibaoshan, you can drive or walk up there from Jianchuan, no need to stay in Shaxi if you are in a rush.

In the Dali region I recommend skipping markets and instead walking Cangshan. Another option is early morning bus to Xiaguan then bus to Jizushan, climb Jizushan, return down the mountain by cablecar, bus back to Xiaguan, bus back to Dali. This is a nice day walk and less tourists than Cangshan. In Dali old town the museum is interesting if you like history, not much else to recommend.

Skip Shilin.

Yuanyang is nice but a long way away. I never worry about the season and always enjoy it, I've been perhaps 4 times. The best terraces are over the crest of the hill on the other side of the mountain range, along the road toward Luchun, most people miss these... don't.

Jianshui itself is skippable these days, the stuff in town being rebuilt to the point of cartoonish false-historic grandeur in the style of Lijiang. On the other hand, the village west of town, Tuoshan, is worth visiting if you are interested in fragments of Qing Dynasty aristocratic architecture, but it is really becoming quite developed now. Another similar village can be found west of Shiping however it is not as dense or easy to visit and is mostly under repairs as of a couple of months ago.

Once you are in Yuanyang you are practically to Vietnam. It might be worth considering flying return to Bangkok, in to Kunming, and then out of Vietnam back to Bangkok. Hanoi is fantastic and coming down the Red River is quite a trip. Yunnan and northern Vietnam are strongly connected since ancient times.