The following is an excerpt from Michelle Higgins, a reporter for The New York Times.

Beat the Crowds to Up & Coming Destinations

Diqing, China

The Diqing area, in northwestern Yunnan, a showcase for traditional Tibetan culture, with monasteries, villages and dramatic terrain, is about to become more accessible. An extensive road project is expected to widen the current road to the township of Deqin to two lanes and add tunnels, cutting the now six-hour drive from Gyalthang, a more touristed region, also known as Zhongdian and Shangri-La, to three hours.

“We believe it’s a great up-and-coming area, and we’re happy to be one of the first on the ground,” said Risa Sekiguchi, product manger for Abercrombie & Kent’s Asia and Pacific region, which is developing a new trip to the area.

Diqing is part of the Three Parallel Rivers of Yunnan Protected Areas, a Unesco World Heritage Site, where the Yangtze, Mekong and Salween Rivers run roughly parallel, through steep gorges. And unlike other Tibetan areas of China, which have been restricted to foreigners periodically, Diqing has largely remained welcoming.

“This area doesn’t have the armed guards, and you don’t have to get special permits to visit,” Ms. Sekiguchi said.

This spring Songtsam, a small group of Tibetan-influenced upscale boutique hotels, plans to open a handful of lodges including Songtsam Meili, on a bluff with views of the Meili Mountain range. Using the hotels as a base, WildChina, an adventure tour operator, has developed a weeklong trek through the region called WildChina Songtsam Circuit: Secrets of Shangri-La. Travelers visit monasteries and Tibetan families and hike along a pilgrimage route to Mount Kawagebo. Cost: $1,985 a person. Abercrombie & Kent also plans to use the hotels as a base for a new trip in 2012.

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To read the full post, please click here. Photo by WildChina.

Shaxi's cobbled streets

The following post is an excerpt from Catherine Bodry, a writer for AOL’s Gadling Travel Blog.

Once an important market town on China’s ancient tea-horse road, Shaxi is one of seemingly very few Chinese villages that have retained their original feel. Quiet, with cobblestone lanes and courtyard homes, Shaxi is currently undergoing a “remodel” to restore and preserve its historical market square, inner village, and, eventually, ready the entire Shaxi Valley for tourism. Though only a few hotels and shops currently smatter the tiny village, there’s no way a town like this will stay this quiet for long. You’ll be rewarded by visiting soon, as the vibe is sure to change after the completion of a new highway nearby.

Gadling was lucky enough to visit Shaxi in November on a trip with WildChina, during which we traced parts of China’s tea-horse caravan route.

Shaxi sits roughly between Lijiang and Dali, and was a halfway point for tea and horse traders traveling between southern Yunnan and Tibet. The town experienced its prime from 1368-1911, when it flourished as a way station along the tea-horse trading route. When the last of the caravans passed through in 1949, Shaxi settled into relative isolation. In 2001, the World Monument Fund added Shaxi’s market square to its Watch List of 100 Most Endangered Sites, as the square had its original theater, temple, and guesthouses. All, however, were in danger from neglect and the potential of shoddy restoration. In partnership between the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich and the People’s Government of Jianchuan County, the first phase of the Shaxi Restoration Project began in 2006, and the village is readying itself for more visitors.

To read full posts from Gadling’s trip to Yunnan, click here.

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Contact Catherine Bodry at catherine.bodry@weblogsinc.com. Photo by Gadling.

With the advent of the New Year comes the annual slew of lists of what to look for in 2011. Publications have picked their top travel destinations for the next year, and several prominent ones have turned the spotlight on new high-end accommodations in lesser-known spots in China. At WildChina, we have been very much focused on the same trend…

That China is making appearances on such lists should come as no surprise. China currently ranks as the world’s fourth most popular travel destination and it is expected to topple the United States and France out of the top slots by the end of the decade (or even sooner).

But it’s not just trips to Beijing and Shanghai that will drive that growth. The New York Times and The Financial Times have cited Hangzhou, Pingyao, and Lhasa as the places to be in China this year, and there is a common thread linking the three. These cities have long had the historical and cultural pull to draw tourists, but now they also have high-end hotels where those tourists can hang their hats at the end of a long day of travel.

The New York Times mentions Jing’s Residence in Pingyao, the ancient town’s first boutique hotel, and a wave of big names setting up shop in Hangzhou, including Shangri-La and the Four Seasons. The Financial Times highlights the St. Regis Lhasa, which represents that chain’s first push into Tibet.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Ken Green, president and managing director of Windham Hotel Group’s Asian-Pacific region, emphasizes the exact same trend; one of the five travel trends he predicts for 2011 is “High-end Products in Smaller Cities.”

“Everyone wants to be in Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing,” he says. “But hey, Hangzhou, Changsha, Chengdu – those are all great cities to visit.”

Zhao Bei, WildChina’s new Assisting General Manager, agrees.

“That’s something we’ve been talking about for some time here at WildChina. You always have to be innovative in the travel industry, and our newest initiative, The WildChina Collection, represents our own efforts to combine comfort with more adventurous travel in China.”

With so many worthy destinations away from China’s bustling east coast, we’re excited to see where 2011 takes us – or more importantly, where it takes you!

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The WildChina Collection an alliance between WildChina and the top boutique hotels in China. Located in the most beautiful, unspoiled and remote regions of China and passionately committed to heritage conservation and ecotourism, our independent partners are not just hoteliers but enablers of a truly immersive experience in their local environs.  Find out more by visiting our website.

Devin is a member of the operations team in WildChina’s Beijing office. Contact him at devin.corrigan@wildchina.com. Photo by Landison Longjing Resort in Hangzhou.

One sunny day in October 2009, I found myself on a wooden walkway overlooking the magnificent quartz-sandstone columns of Zhangjiajie National Forest Park, Hunan province. As I stood trying to take in the view, wave after wave of people pushed past me, eager to have their photos taken and move on. Around every corner, park staff dressed in ethnic minority clothing touted overpriced skewers, rickshaw rides and plastic bric-a-brac, and guides wielding megaphones shouted in a dozen different dialects. Fed up, tired and irritable, I then queued two hours to exit the park.

Unfortunately, most of China’s tourism still caters to the mass market. Zhangjiajie received thousands of visitors over the 2009 Golden Week Holiday alone, while Beijing’s iconic Bird’s Nest stadium received over 30,000 people per day in 2009. So many people passing through a place puts intense pressure on the local environment. What’s more, visitors are shuttled from site to site by large tour operators, outside investors open restaurants and hotels, and local communities have neither the money nor the skills to compete with them. Locals either move out or become part of the show, performing ‘traditional’ singing and dancing routines or selling tacky souvenirs.

But tourism, if managed properly, can be a powerful engine for social change. The concept of responsible travel has been around for three decades, and is based on the principle that tourism should:

• respect and preserve local culture and heritage;
• protect the environment and conserve natural resources;
• help local communities develop and improve their quality of life.

Happily, this form of tourism is gaining increasing support within China, from both the eco-conscious traveller and those who want to escape the masses and have a more meaningful experience.

RECHARGE YOUR BATTERIES

A common misconception is that sustainability means the sacrifice of creature comforts and convenience. While some eco-lodges do offer a more rustic taste of simple village life, places like The Schoolhouse at Mutianyu in Beijing, naked Retreats in Moganshan just outside of Shanghai and Crosswaters Ecolodge & Spa two hours travel from Hong Kong, are showing that high-end sustainable tourism is possible. Conveniently located right outside major cities, these beautiful retreats attract urbanites looking to escape the business of city life, reconnect with nature and recharge their batteries.

This piece was written by Samantha Woods, Sustainability Manager for WildChina. Read the full article here. WildChina’s signature community service trips for schools and our new Sustainable Leadership Academy for businesses take travellers to experience China differently and create meaningful change in underserved rural communities.

Samantha.Woods@WildChina.com

WildChina would like to congratulate our friends at the Linden Centre for receiving a 2010 Global Vision award from Travel + Leisure magazine!

Located in the small town of Xizhou in southwest China’s beautiful Yunnan province, the Linden Centre has been promoting a different kind of tourism that highlights the culture and traditions of the Bai people who inhabit Xizhou and neighboring Dali.

The Centre is a renovated traditional Bai courtyard home that has excellent views of the surrounding rice paddies, as well as the stunning Cangshan Mountains plus scenic and expansive Erhai Lake. Upon stepping into the Centre, it becomes clear why the Chinese government made it a protected heritage site.

Over the last year and a half, the Centre has introduced hundreds of guests to aspects of Bai and Chinese culture that they would have missed out on elsewhere – and they have been recognized for doing so. It has received rave reviews on TripAdvisor and was voted best boutique inn in China on the popular Chinese portal Sina.com.

The Linden Centre was a natural choice for inclusion in our recently launched network of boutique hotels, the WildChina Collection.

To learn more about the Linden Centre and its vision, check out our recent interview with its founder, Brian Linden.

Throughout WildChina’s years of pioneering sustainable off-the-beaten path travel in China, we have been impressed and encouraged by our encounters with visionary individuals who are trying to push the boundaries of traveling in China, creating unique boutique hotels integrated into local communities in the most remote and beautiful regions.

They care passionately about revealing the depth and breadth of natural and cultural beauties to their visitors in a way that is respectful of local traditions, and thus inevitably find themselves spending a lot of time acting personally as travel guides for their guests, and/or dealing with the minutiae of logistics planning in regions where travel infrastructure is patchy or non-existent.

Over time, many of these individuals began to feel that the original impetus which propelled them into the travel industry – whether it was creating eco-lodges from sustainable materials,  transforming and restoring ancient landmarks into museum-hotels or creating opportunities for local communities – was becoming bogged down in the exhausting details of operations management.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful, we heard over and over again, if someone could train trekking guides, bring in anthropologists and historians to act as cultural guides, and take over logistics management?  Wouldn’t it be wonderful to create alliances with other like-minded hotels in the region, passing guests along a circuit, thus exponentially expanding their appeal to travelers interested in exploring an entire province? Wouldn’t it be wonderful, they started to ask us, if you at WildChina could address these issues to free us up to pioneer new boutique hotels in the untouched hinterlands?

The WildChina Collection is the result.

The WildChina Collection is a unique alliance of boutique hotels in the most beautiful, un-spoilt and remote regions of China. Passionately committed to heritage conservation and ecological and sustainable lifestyles, our independent partners are not just hoteliers but enablers of a truly immersive experience in their local environs. The Collection is designed to allow our guests to share in this passion and the unique experiences it offers.

Curious? Learn more by browsing the WildChina Collection hotels and circuits on our website. For more information, send us an email at collection[at]wildchina[dot]com.

Sometimes the most unlikely partnerships can lead to fantastic results. Such is the story of the Linden Centre, a one-of-a-kind boutique hotel set in the small town of Xizhou, about 20 miles north of Dali in southwest China’s Yunnan province.

The Linden Centre itself is a meticulously restored traditional Bai courtyard home dating back to another era, but it is the cooperation between a visionary American couple and the local government that is the foundation for the Centre’s success – it has already been named one of the top boutique hotels in China by publications around the country. With full support from the Xizhou government and protected status on par with the Great Wall, the Linden Centre is the brainchild of Brian and Jeanee Linden, who had previously been coming to China to find unique crafts and artwork for their gallery in Door County, Wisconsin.

Brian Linden is a true ‘old China hand’ – he first came here in 1984 to study Chinese and later worked as a cameraman and translator for CBS. He and Jeanee have poured time, effort and money into making the Linden Centre what it is today: an example of how cultural heritage can be preserved while creating a platform for cultural exchange. WildChina spoke with Brian Linden about the Centre’s achievements and its vision for the future:

WildChina: What makes Xizhou a unique travel destination?

Brian Linden: Xizhou is unique because it is a functioning village full of historical complexes. The Xizhou merchants of the 19th and early 20th centuries built over 100 stone and wood courtyard homes, most in the san fang yi zhao bi style [three sides of the courtyard dedicated to living quarters and one side highlighting a work of art]. These structures exist and currently function as homes and local businesses. They have not been gentrified nor sold to outsiders to open t-shirt shops. In this regard, it allows visitors to see a slice of traditional Bai village life – made all the more interesting because of the stunning architectural legacy. Most of our guests stay 4-5 days, and we have yet to have any complaints about Xizhou.

The Linden Centre frequently hosts cultural events and performances

WildChina: What are the goals of the Linden Centre?

Linden: To develop a new travel paradigm that focuses on learning and cultural immersion. This model’s uniqueness is that we are targeting adults, who want an indigenous experience but can also recognize elegance in art and antiques and culinary options. The Centre is completely different from any other hotel in China. We have as many staff as guests usually, and it our staff’s job to help our discerning guests to go beyond the contemporary facades of China.

WildChina: What have the highlights of the Centre’s existence been so far?

Linden: While Jeanee and I did not set out to establish a hotel but rather an intellectual retreat in the Aspen Institute tradition, we are proud to have been selected as the Best Boutique Hotel in China by Sina.com and the most interesting hotel in SW China by Xinzhoukan. We are also the top rated hotel in all of China among over 32,000 other properties on Tripadvisor. We have stories about us in Travel+Leisure, Atlantic Monthly, Food and Wine, dozens of Chinese and Asian magazines and newspapers, and have recently hosted renowned writer Amitav Ghosh who is doing an article about the Centre and region for Condé Nast India.

WildChina: The Centre is obviously a labor of love, what do you find most rewarding about it?

Linden: Because of the CCTV documentaries about us, we have had a constant flow of Chinese visitors from around the country, many of whom have traveled from north and south China to express their support for our efforts. This has been very touching. We also have been moved by our guests’ responses to the local immersions. We consistently have visitors with tears in their eyes when it comes time to leave the Centre. This is a wonderful feeling, especially when we know that we have helped expand our guests’ views of China. Most guests feel like they never truly felt China or knew the non-urban Chinese until they spent time with us. We are hoping that this expanded view will help lead to greater understanding between East and West.

Visitors to the Linden Centre take part in a variety of cultural immersion activities

WildChina: How is Bai architecture different from traditional Han Chinese architecture?

Linden: One of the first things that our guests comment on is the Bai tradition of painting on their homes. Most houses in Xizhou have series of paintings lining their upper walls, just below the roofline. These paintings, which are still being created on new buildings in Xizhou, depict flowers, animals and even city scenes from 1920s Shanghai and England! The pleasant weather in Dali also has allowed the Bai people to truly incorporate the courtyard space into a year-round functioning living area. These courtyards often serve as open air dining areas for the family, homework space for the children, and weaving areas for the women. Time is spent mainly in these open courtyards, thus greatly expanding the living space for the typical Bai family.

WildChina: How does the Linden Centre interact with the local community in Xizhou?

Linden: We offer weekly language interaction classes with local kindergartens and spend Saturday evenings at our village activity center teaching English to the local community. We are working with the local government to help place visiting doctors, teachers and carpenters in village facilities. We plan to establish a program to help rebuild old temples. We also will be developing a museum in Xizhou.

WildChina: What are your plans for the future?

Linden: We have been inundated with requests to expand our sites to other locations. These often come from local governments who feel that we would be a great asset for their communities. We are seriously looking into Weishan and Kunming as future sites. We also hope to develop our second complex in Xizhou, the former town hall, into an artist-in-residence center and a daytime cooking school.

WildChina is pleased to include the Linden Centre in the WildChina Collection – watch this space for more info!

The Year of the Tiger is rapidly approaching (it begins on February 14). In the Chinese zodiac, the tiger has always been a marker of great change, development, and improvement. Taking this to heart, WildChina has made big goals for the new year, which include initiatives that will enable us to better connect bolster and increase our community service, environmental protection and sustainable development partnerships.

As part of our WildChina Collection initiative, we’ve created a new series on our blog, the WildChina Collection ReviewBlog, which features our reviews of sites, hotels, and restaurants on our blog to keep readers informed of up-to-date information and trends in niche and boutique travel options. 

Our inaugural ReviewBlog post takes us to Shanghai:

WildChina Operations team members Nellie and Rebecca recently visited Shanghai to review client accommodations. Here is their take on two upscale Shanghai hotels, The Peninsula Shanghai and JIA Shanghai.

The Peninsula Shanghai

Location: Located on the main Bund strip. Although there is currently a lot of road work in the area for the World Expo, it will be completed by the end of Chinese New Year.

Service: Excellent; most staff speaks reasonably good English.

Aesthetic: Lobby decor is classic and elegant, and is a throwback to 1920s-era Shanghai.

Accommodations: Offers a wide range of rooms, from Superior Rooms and Deluxe Garden Rooms to a host of luxury suites. Rooms host a bevy of services and amenities, including plush furnishings and beds, electronics, and internet.

Dining: The Peninsula provides a variety of options for guests. Breakfast is a la carte and is served until 11:00am. Restaurants include Yi Long Court (Cantonese with private dining rooms) and Sir Elly’s (Western with private rooms). Room service is also available.

Recreation: The Peninsula boasts a spa, fitness center, indoor swimming pool and outdoor sun terrace.

WildChina says: “Great location with fantastic service and spectacular views. Attention to detail is absolutely impeccable. Easily the best 5-star hotel in Shanghai.” –Nellie

Make reservations here.

JIA Shanghai

Location: Located by the West Nanjing Road subway, JIA Shanghai is surrounded by hip shops and restaurants.

Service: Staff members were friendly and their English was better than average.

Aesthetic: Romantically dark. Walkways leading to elevators and rooms are dimly lit, with the light green wood doors being the only highlight in the walkways to elevators and rooms.

Accommodations: Studios and suites are available, and are beautifully designed in an eclectic modern style. Rooms are outfitted with designer modern furniture, and high-tech amenities.

Dining: Continental Breakfast is served. Issimo Restaurant offers Italian cuisine, while Issimo Bar serves classic cocktails, wine and champagne.

Recreation: JIA houses a small but well-appointed gym on the 2th floor, which  treadmills, bicycles, and weight equipment.

WildChina says: “The ‘it’ choice for boutique accommodation in Shanghai – high-end urban cool provides intimacy for design-oriented travelers. ISSIMO is equal parts hip and delicious, providing tasty fare in a trendy atmosphere.” –Nellie

Make reservations here.

Curious about accommodations, sites, restaurants, or other venues in China? Tweet at us (@WildChina) or send an email to Alex Grieves at alex.grieves@wildchina.com. We’ll try to include your inquiry in our next post.