Visiting China this summer
I am planning a month long trip to China in August. I will land in Shanghai and spent a week or two there, then out to Xi'an and then a week in Taibei, Taiwan on the way back. If you have any advice about where to stay, where to visit, the weather in August. I speak conversational Chinese but have not been there in 35 years!
Also, the visa application process seems to mandate that I have buy my plane tickets and reserve accommodations in advance as part of the application process. I expected to need the visa before getting all the rest together! Any thoughts or advice is much appreciated!
Mar 1, 2024
Parent Replies
A month in China & Taiwan! That is very exciting. Here’s to a great trip.
I went 8 years ago for 2 weeks to three destinations in China and and had the same visa issue.
Plane tickets: I bought three one-way plane tickets for my initial destination, an in-China flight and the return to the US. The return I bought with miles so if I changed the return there would be (at that time) no fee to refund or change. Today the change fees are minimal but the rules keep changing…You need to research that and confirm. Include the printed flight receipts with your visa application.
Accommodations: I made refundable reservations at hotels to satisfy the visa paperwork. I simply included the printed itinerary with my application.
You are allowed to change your mind and stay elsewhere and even change your destinations! No need to update the visa docs. I believe I only ended up changing one hotel.
The hotels where you end up staying document you so it’s not like “they” are not watching your every move anyway.
Good Luck
Pre-COVID, we usually get visa done through a travel agent. You pay a bit extra, but it's pretty much guaranteed success and no need to make a trip to the consulate. You just drop off passport and application + fee and pick back up a week or so later. I don't remember booking trips prior to application, but we did have a general time frame that we were going to travel. The travel agent in the 99 Ranch plaza is where we get ours. If they still have this service, this could be a major time/effort saver.