This past week, China Daily reported that Beijing’s rescue team, “Luye,” responded to four emergency calls during the week-long October Holiday alone – all from travelers who needed assistance in remote areas outside of the city proper.

As, according to the article, this and similar teams received only 9 similar calls for all of 2009, what is causing this rising trend in travel emergencies?

Luye head Lu Zhonghong attributed the increase to lesser-known spots preferred by travelers and lack of know-how, saying, ”Most people who get into trouble those days are travelers without professional knowledge and the equipment they need to hike.”

Though “people increasingly prefer to travel in undeveloped areas and in the mountains around the city,”  he said “it can be very dangerous to climb such peaks, especially when people are not familiar with the terrain.”

We’re strong proponents of off-the-beaten-path travel in China – but, safety is also our first priority. Here are our tips for experiencing China’s unique sites without ending up lost, injured, or worse:

1. Choose your destination wisely: Adventure is one thing; danger is another. Research destinations carefully, because someone’s definition of “difficult” might be your idea of certainly unsafe. Consult travel operators, travel review websites, and other travelers.
2. Explore with an expert: Just because you’re a good adventurer doesn’t necessarily mean you can navigate unknown terrain without a local guide. Do your research and make sure that you are traveling with a well-trained, experienced guide who can knows the area, terrain, and routes like the back of his or her hand. (We know plenty – just ask.)
3. Off-road during the off-peak: Holiday periods in China are notorious for logistical issues that may cause delays and cancellations. If you are traveling remotely during a Golden Week or other popular travel period, emergency services may not be able to act as swiftly on your behalf. Choose a time to adventure when rescue teams, hospitals, and police will be less busy.
4. Have connections handy: If you’ve traveled China extensively or live in the country, you might not want a guide to take you beyond the tourist hubs. In that case, make sure that you have plenty of local contacts whom you can call or find in the event of an emergency. Information for friends’ families, local hotel / lodge owners, and regional emergency hotlines should be on hand at all times.
5. And, of course, do not travel alone.

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.

Nang got you down? Eat nuts and dried fruit.

I recently returned to WildChina’s Beijing office after spending 11 days in Gansu province, and a friend similarly returned via train to the capital city yesterday after a month in Xinjiang. Back in the comforts of Beijing, we compared notes about how to successfully, comfortably, and cleanly traverse China’s Western provinces. Here are our best tips, combined:

1. Bring dried fruit and nuts for fulfilling and nutritious snacks/meal supplements: My friend loved Xinjiang’s famous nang bread and pulled noodles, but after five days of eating them for almost every meal, she felt neither inspired nor healthy from the carb-heavy Uyghur cuisine. To vary her diet for taste and health, she brought bags of dried fruit and nuts from Beijing, where she found cheap and delicious varieties at Sanyuanli Market (right by the WildChina office!). This way, she was able to get enough protein and fiber on the road when she didn’t have many dining options.
2. Don a sturdy pair of jeans: This may seem obvious, but I could not have a) horse trekked, b) camped warmly, c) visited historic sites in the rain, or d) gone to dinner when the weather was cooler without my sole pair of blues. I wore them almost every day, and they served me very well. As the summer in the West is generally a bit cooler than in the East, jeans are a necessity for both outdoor and indoor activities.
3. Be flexible with your time: Life in China’s West is much more laidback than that in the East – it’s less-developed, and so people feel less of a rush at work and at play. Make your schedule so that it accommodates the easygoing attitude. Your body will thank you, too – in places of higher elevation (such as Gansu’s grasslands), you’ll naturally feel more tired and less inclined to have a super-packed day.
4. Learn to wash your hair in the sink: Less infrastructure and a lower standard of living in the West means fewer washing facilities. Work with what you have to get clean (i.e. sinks, streams, bottled water, hoses, etc.). The cooler, drier climate means that you’ll probably sweat less, so showering should hopefully not be as crucial. In any case, bring a bandana and moisture-wicking clothing.
5. Bring toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and a stain remover stick: You’ll be set for any surprising situation (basic bathrooms [or none at all], dirty busses, oil from dinner on your only shirt) with these.

Have more questions? Send us a tweet.

At WildChina’s Beijing office, we loved the playful and poetic piece by CNNGo‘s Dan Ouyang, “72 Hours in Yangshuo: Tourist town by trade, simple village at heart,” on one of Guangxi’s most charming areas.

Our personal highlight from the article was Ouyang’s description of the bike ride to Fuli Town. She sums it up perfectly: “Bicycling on nearly deserted roads, we passed by solitary farmers in rice paddies, water buffalo lowing in ponds, sandal-clad provincial bee farmers and tourist couples on tandem bikes, all against a postcard-perfect backdrop.” 

On bike, visitors to Guangxi can marvel at natural landscapes and local communities, like Langzi Village.

While the town is nothing special in comparison to Guangxi’s many delights (as she mentions), we agree that the trip through the province’s rustic landscapes she describes is simply fantastic. 

Ouyang’s 72-hour trip around Yangshuo is perfect for the area, but if you’d like to venture out and see a bit more of the province, we recommend 5 days in total. Our Rustic Guilin itinerary, which includes Longsheng and the Li River as well as Yangshuo, gets to the heart of Guangxi’s rural charm. Or, if you’re looking for an in-depth adventure that combines culture with natural splendor, tack on a few extra days with our Stepping into the Scroll journey.

I saw a client email to my staff another day, requesting a series of changes to the itineraries we proposed. The client’s email read:

1. There is a scheduled visit to the Temple of Heaven in the morning of the 3rd day, and it says learning Taiqi from a master. Please delete that, we are not interested in activities contrived for tourists.
2. There is a visit to a sturgeon farm in Yichang while I only want to go see the 3 gorges, and have no interest in sturgeons.
3. Day 16 is a visit to Fuli. Fan making is of limited interest to us. What makes this an interesting place to visit?

As I read along, I knew we that we had found the ideal clients – they are engaged, well traveled, and want to make sure they see the authentic China. Yet, I cringed, knowing very well that if my staff followed the email instruction to delete these activities, the clients would miss out on exactly what they were seeking – the real China experience. So I hopped on the phone.

Activities like traditional Chinese shoemaking: opportunities for cultural exchange, or activities simply organized for tourism profits?

The clients told me that they were seeking a couple of things: a) a basic understanding of the history of China; b) a contrast to the developed and developing parts of China to understand its diversity; and c) exposure to the unspoiled, traditional China.

Why would WildChina staff arrange the guests to go to Temple of Heaven early in the morning to learn Taiqi? I remember that when I lived in Beijing, one of my favorite activities was to go to Ritan Park at 6 am and simply observe the Beijing residents do their morning exercises. Some would sing at the top of their lungs, some would do fan dances, some would throw their bodies against a tree, and some would do Taiqi. It’s simply the best time to people watch and connect.

I went back to the park again with my 1-year-old daughter strapped on my back in a carrier. Those old ladies in the park would walk up to me, grab my daughter’s thigh, and ask me in amazement, “孩子怎么这么胖？喂什么了？就喝你的奶呀?” (How can this baby be so fat? What do you feed her? She just drinks your milk?”) I’ll save you the answer here, but the point is, these parks in the morning are the real China. Fresh from a full night’s sleep, people connect as real people, with little inhibition or consideration of “cultural differences.”

Now, the sturgeon farm near the Three Gorges. I was delighted to know when my staff first added this visit to the itinerary. My distaste for the Yangtze Cruise is well known at WildChina, and I even spoke about this at the New York Times Travel Show on Sunday, February 28th earlier this year. There are better places to see the Yangtze River, but it’s most interesting to understand the environmental and economic challenges brought about by the dam. Visiting a sturgeon farm, for me, is a time when I get to meet the local entrepreneur to understand how their way of living changed because of the dam. When did they start the business, and to whom do they sell? How has that changed with the dam? To understand the real China, one has to get to these places that are off the travel industry route to find out.

As for Fuli village near Guilin: potential clients have never heard about this village. It’s not in tourist guidebooks, as most tourists on the Li River Cruise would bypass the village. That’s a blessing for the villagers, who still live a very traditional agrarian lifestyle, while hand crafting Chinese paper fans as a side business. Seeing how the local artisans carefully paint those fans is almost a Zen moment for me.

I remember when I was little, people told me that Westerners pay more for hand-made things and less for machine-made things. I couldn’t understand why, because I was eager to trade in the cotton-soled shoes (棉底布鞋), which my grandmother made under a dim light, for a pair of pink plastic sandals! Now, I would be willing to pay whatever to have one more pair of her 布鞋，if she were still around.

Strange how time changes, and how I long for the China I grew up with.

Follow Mei on Twitter: @yunnangirl.

As China’s best luxury tour operator with a focus on customized, off-the-beaten-path tours to China, WildChina specializes in making family trips to China exciting, memorable, and hassle-free for both children and parents.

This morning at the WildChina Beijing office, we read Eva Vasquez’s excellent CNN article on luxury family travel with great interest, as this type of travel to China is increasingly common. Vasquez’s practical advice – from determining appropriate activities for your family and choosing how much to plan, to involving children in decision-making and more – helps traveling families decide how to make the most of our their experience.

Make a visit to Shaolin, Henan fun for the whole family: enjoy an afternoon kungfu demonstration together.

WildChina similarly subscribes to many of the ideas Vasquez writes of in her article. For example, for our Classic China Family Vacation: Beijing, Xi’an, Guilin & Shanghai, we make sure to choose hotels in these metropolitan cities with kid-friendly pools. Pint-sized travelers on our Cultural Family Vacation: Beijing, Henan, Xi’an, Yunnan & Shanghai can delight in hands-on activities to help them learn about traditional Chinese culture.

What are other important points to keep in mind for a luxury family trip specifically to China? Barbara Henderson, WildChina’s Director of Private Journeys, has a few key tips for successful luxury family travel in China:

1. Inquire about “wow” moments just for the kids. Rather than simply including your children on your family trip, ask for child-friendly activities to keep them entertained and engaged. Activities like kite-making, kungfu lessons and calligraphy will make China more accessible and interesting for them.

2. With young children, bring your own carseat and stroller. You can buy these in China, but they might not be up to the safety standards that you are used to. Keep your trip worry-free by bringing the products you trust.

3. Let guides know if your child is a picky eater. Some children are incredibly adventurous when it comes to Chinese (or other) food, whereas some prefer to eat macaroni and cheese exclusively. No one wants a hungry child and upset child if they refuse food at every meal, so be clear to arrange options and alternatives accordingly.

4. Educate your children on China’s culture and history. They’ll get the most out of their China trip if they have some concept of China beforehand. Read up on specific historic sites, monuments, and/or destinations you will visit, so that children can connect stories with the real thing once you arrive.

5. Want a special evening out? Arrange babysitters with your tour operator. See what your guides have to say about hired help for an evening where you are staying. Rather than just hiring someone to watch television, your tour operator might be able to find fun ways to engage your child while you enjoy a special performance or nice dinner out.

Want more tips for travel in China? Email us at info@wildchina.com, or send us a tweet @WildChina.

After Wednesday night’s festivities on the grasslands, I wasn’t sure that anything could top our bonfire / singing / storytelling experience. However, Thursday proved to be equally eye-opening, with more hands-on activities and more unique perspectives on local life.

We began the morning with a Naadam Festival demonstration by the local nomadic men, as the real games begin in mid-July. As I discussed in a previous blog post, Naadam, which literally means “games” in Mongolian, is a summertime event comprised of traditional Mongolian wrestling, archery, and horse racing.

To begin, a group of ten riders raced at lightning speed along the grasslands, displaying their incredible horsemanship skills. Later, we witnessed a Mongolian wrestling competition, in which the goal is to get an opponent’s body part (other than his feet) to touch the ground. Our guests delighted when they were handed the uniform to take part! Slowly but surely, a few pairs donned traditional garb to challenge one another to friendly matches in true Mongolian style.

Our hands-on day didn’t stop there. For lunch, we drove another 30 minutes to a smaller yurt community that was managed by a single family. There, in a larger yurt, we sat around tables learning how to make Mongolian dumplings. Helping our guests manipulate the dumpling dough to create the perfect shape was a fun challenge. While some found it to be an easier task than others, the process was enjoyed by all.

Crafting Mongolian dumplings in the sun.

The homemade lunch on which we dined from the local family was incredible. Before we even began eating, I felt so lucky that this family had invited the guides and drivers into their own dining room for this lunch. It was one thing to eat their freshly-prepared food, but another to consume it where they usually have their own meals.

As for the food itself, the freshest eggs and lamb graced our table, and made even the most standard of Chinese dishes – such as egg and tomato – that much more delicious. Potato noodles, lamb stew, lamb dumplings, bitter melon, and other local specialties graced our table that afternoon. This meal reaffirmed for me that Chinese home cooking is truly the best in China. Regional classics with a family touch, in my experience, has a taste that no restaurant can replicate.

On our second-to-last day in Inner Mongolia, as I sat with my fellow guides and drivers, I felt like a part of a Chinese family at an intimate home gathering.

Stay tuned for more of my stories from Inner Mongolia on the WildChina blog.

As night fell on the grasslands after our afternoon of yurt building, Shirley, my fellow local guides, our guides and I left our nomadic accommodations for nighttime revelry, Inner Mongolia-style.

The sun sets over the Xilamuren Grasslands before nighttime festivities begin.

In the communal area bordered by yurts, we gathered around a bonfire to watch traditional Mongolian dance and throat singing. In Mongolian tradition, throat singing, or “khoomii,” is characterized by replacing all musical instruments with vocals, so that the voice emulates the sound of such instruments. Ranging from very low notes to higher octaves, throat singing is incredibly relaxing (in my opinion). On the quiet grasslands, our small huddle of eager listeners around the singers was an intimate and unique way to listen to this seldom-heard style of music. (Beijingers, you may be familiar with throat singing after watching Beijing-based Mongolian folk band Hanggai Band perform either at Amilal or a music event around the city.)

Once the bonfire had died out and the singers retired for the night, we retreated to a large, communal yurt for an hour of storytelling. Seated on the floor, our guests listened to grand tales of Genghis Khan, the great Mongol leader, and his adventures and conquests. While Genghis Khan has his fair share of misdoings, his tales also promote universally-applicable morality and life lessons. They were greatly enjoyed by our guests.

Stories told, we gathered our belongings and returned to our respective yurts. Shirley and I discussed the following days’ plans with our local Inner Mongolian guides and chatted for a bit. Our Inner Mongolian guides were easygoing and interesting to talk to – after enjoying their company for the past few days and learning more about their lives in this northern province, I didn’t want to go to sleep! But, after half an hour, Shirley and I left their yurt, ready to prepare ourselves with numerous blankets for a cold night in the grasslands. Thursday, we knew, would be warmer.

Stay tuned for more of my stories from Inner Mongolia on the WildChina blog.

I just did an interview by email with Chris Horton, Founder / Editor of GoKunming. His questions brought back so many nice memories of Yunnan. Thought I’d share them here:

Chris Horton: Where in Dali did you grow up? What are some of your strongest memories of that time of your life?
Mei Zhang: I grew up in Dali until I was 9. That’s when my family moved to Kunming. My memories of that time that keep coming back are many. We used to go to a hot spring for baths near Xiaguan. There are always camellia blooming, and we’d climb the mountain behind the hot spring to pick big white flowers (Rhododendrons as I learned later). There were so many of those white flowers that we’d cook them for dinner! I remember people in Dali loved flowers, there are wild jasmines and other fragrant flowers for sale in the market all the time. Talking about market, that’s my favorite. Many different ethnic people would also come to the market, the Yis or Bais, wearing beautiful clothes, selling fresh vegetables and eggs. I still come back to Yunnan to search for those moments. (By the way, thank you for asking this question, it brought back so many nice memories.)

Mei Zhang: Yunnan native, WildChina founder, China travel expert, entrepreneur and mother

CH: What was the chain of events that led you from Dali to Harvard?
MZ: If this didn’t happen to me, I wouldn’t have believed events like this would ever happen. So my Dad, who was a worker building the hydropower station in Xiaguan, decided that the best thing he could do for me and my brothers was to give us the best education possible. He moved us to Kunming for better education. When I was testing for high school, he made me apply to the Foreign Languages school affiliated to Yunnan University, hoping that if I couldn’t get into college, at least I’d have some English to be a secretary. I got it, but I cried and cried, believing that he robbed me of the opportunity to become Madam. Currie of China. After that, I got into Yunnan University, studying English and Law. I started taking part time jobs as an interpreter since college to pay for school. Then one day, at an usual official banquet hosted by Yunnan Government for Krung Thai Bank from Thailand, my life changed. The president of the bank decided to give a spontaneous speech. None of the government interpreters were willing to go up to the stage with him, as there was no preparation, no script. They all recommend that I go up onto the stage, as I was the youngest interpreter with nothing to lose. So, I did. After that, the officials from the Bank invited me to sit at their table, and offered me a scholarship I couldn’t resist. The rest is history.

CH: What was the inspiration behind founding Wild China in 2000?
MZ: See here: http://www.wildchina.com/application/assets/img/press/pdfs/World-of-Chinese—See-a-Different-China.pdf

CH: What are the most surprising or amazing places you’ve discovered in China since then?
MZ: There are many, so I’ll just pick a few from memory. I remember seeing the villages near the Yellow Mountains for the first time. I was struck by how beautiful the traditional architecture was, and how much history the places endured, and how sad the current state was – all adults gone to work in the city as migrant workers, with only grandparents and kids left in the village. Guizhou Province also struck me an unbelievable place. It’s also in the Southwest of China, but incredibly poor and lack of development. In a way, it reminds me of the Yunnan I grew up with. Rice terraced fields with ethnic hamlets scattered here and there. Traditional lifestyle that’s so beautiful and the hardship so challenging. That’s the China I knew and loved.

CH: What notable changes have you seen in China’s travel industry since 2000?
MZ: The extraordinary growth of domestic travelers spurred incredible growth in the travel industry. There have been some great advances, for example, I just visited Heshun village near Tengchong in Yunnan. I have to give the development company a lot of credit and respect. I think they did an amazing job keeping the beauty of the place while making it accessible to the general public. The landscaping is beautiful and tastefully done, and the written materials are interesting and well done. There are more and more lodges and hotels that are also tastefully done around the country. These are all great. But, I feel sorry for sites and places that are too quickly run over by tourist crowds. Lijiang old town is a prime example.

CH: How often does Yunnan figure into your clients’ travel plans? What are the most popular destinations?
MZ: Very often. It’s one of our top destinations. Before I traveled the world, I thought I was just biased because I was from Yunnan. Now that I have been to Mt. Everest, South Africa, Italy, Peru, you name it, I know Yunnan IS one of the most extraordinary destinations in the world!

CH: What are your favorite places in Yunnan?
MZ: My favorites are: Cizhong in Diqing, I find the catholic Tibetan cultures fascinating; Shaxi Jianchuan Grottoes, I loved the long history behind the whole Tea and Horse caravan road; Tengchong and Gaoligong Mountain, I love the incredible bio diversity there and the WWII history. I just hiked across Gaoligong from Baoshan to Tengchong last week, and thought it’s one of the most beautiful hikes I have ever had. After the hike, I called Gaoligong Nature Reserve, and told them that I’d sponsor them in publishing a birding book! Look for it, it’s coming out next year.

CH: Wild China has carved out a niche for itself as a provider of sustainable and socially responsible tourism in China for foreigners, do you see these concepts ever becoming important to the domestic tourism market?
MZ: Absolutely, we want to get involved in the domestic tourism market as well, but we have a wait a little bit for the demand to build up more. In the meantime, we are speaking at different forums etc to influence Chinese travelers.

CH: Spending much of your time between Beijing and the US, you’re usually far away from Yunnan… what Yunnan dishes do you miss the most?
MZ: I actually make it to Yunnan a lot! At least twice a year, and spending some solid time in the mountains. Yunnan Rice Noodles (mixian) is probably the one dish I miss most. I am a good cook, so can fabricate most items including suancai (pickled greens) myself, but the noodle is beyond me.

Learn more about Mei Zhang and the WildChina story.

Go to the interview link on GoKunming.

WildChina’s Alex Grieves recently interviewed Jeff Fuchs, the first westerner to traverse the historic Tea Horse Caravan Route, author of The Ancient Tea Horse Road: Travels with the Last of the Himalayan Muleteers, and WildChina expert. The route, which spans from Nepal, through China’s Yunnan province, and finally into Tibet, has for centuries been mysterious to outsiders, at best, but is usually simply unknown.

Jeff Fuchs: Ancient Tea and Horse Caravan Road explorer, author, WildChina expert, and avid tea drinker

Fuchs explains his collaboration with WildChina on the series of unique, once-in-a-lifetime journeys on the Road; why this route is profoundly important, historically and culturally; and how Himalayan nomads may be the key to understanding climate change.

WildChina Travel: How did you begin your partnership with WildChina? How will you both collaborate?

Jeff Fuchs: I first met Mei [Zhang, founder of WildChina] after a good friend mentioned to Mei at the PURE conference in Morocco and to me (later) that we should meet at the PURE conference in 2009. I had done work with the Spanish Geographical Society, and Mei was close with a Spanish travel company whose founder had long been an admirer of my work. Mei had also heard about me through press on my expedition on the Road, since I was the first Westerner to have traveled the entire route. We bonded over a mutual interested in the Tea Horse Road – we both have passion for this incredible route that’s received little press in the United States, and we wanted to bring its incredible story to light. WildChina doesn’t just want to promote the route, but rather has a deeper purpose to give travelers an intimate look at China – I believe in that. Mei put me in touch with Jia [Liming, WildChina’s Director of Operations and Business Development] to put itineraries together for the Road.

Read the rest of this entry »