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Our guests ask about visas, payment, weather, safety, food, internet, language, and emergencies. This page collects the questions we hear most often and the answers our team has refined over ten years and 10,000+ inquiries.
Spring/autumn classic routes: 90 days. Tibet/Silk Road peak: 4-6 months. Off-season: 30-60 days minimum.
Our 60-day average lead time gives time to source the right hotels, lock the best guide assignments, and confirm restricted-region permits (Tibet, Xinjiang).
Two years of walking taught Mr Xu what brochures never could — that the depth China rewards is not on the marquee circuit.
Most questions fall into eight buckets. Skim the ones that match your situation — if your specific question isn't here, our strategists can answer within 24 hours.
Parent group operates outbound + inbound across 60+ cities; financial stability and supplier-level access.
Founder's two-year journey on foot defined the brand's commitment to slow, deep travel.
Four partners with complementary expertise. Every booking touched by all four functions.
If you only have two minutes, these are the five questions guests most ask before booking.
| Topic | Quick answer | Notes | Detail | Further reading |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Booking | Q: How far ahead should I book? A: 90 days for spring/autumn classics; 4-6 months for Tibet, Silk Road, or peak Mongol/Yunnan dates. | 60-day average lead time | Most travellers book at this window | Founder-reviewed itineraries |
| Visa | Q: Do I need a tourist visa? A: 50+ nationalities now qualify for 240-hour visa-free transit. The rest apply for Type L tourist visa — we provide the invitation. | 240-hour transit visa-free | Most EU/UK/US visitors | Or Type L for journey-led visits |
| Payment | Q: Can I pay locally? A: Yes, scope wise. We accept Visa/Mastercard, and Stripe; pre-arrival or post-arrival; Refundable per booking policy. | Refundable per booking | Stripe + bank transfer | Wire transfer for groups |
| Itinerary | Q: How flexible after booking? A: Full flexibility on activities and pacing up to 7 days pre-arrival. Refundable to 30 days out. | Flexible up to 30 days | Activities to 7 days out | Locked pre-arrival |
| Languages | Q: All guides speak English? A: Yes — all 30+ guides are certified English-speaking; bilingual Chinese available for fluency-curious travel. | All 30+ guides | Certified English-speaking | Bilingual Chinese available |
Is private travel in China actually safer — for women, families, seniors, solo travelers? Our answer based on 10,000+ guests.
Between January 2014 and December 2015, Mr Xu walked solo across Yunnan, Sichuan, Tibet, Qinghai, and Inner Mongolia following the historical Tea Horse Road — the centuries-old corridor traders used to move Yunnan tea bricks into Tibet and beyond. 6,000 kilometres on foot. Some weeks twenty kilometres a day. Some weeks a tea-farming family hosted him for a fortnight while a storm passed.
Mr Xu's walk produced the supplier network that now anchors ChinaTourly's ICH master sessions and rural ethnic-minority itineraries.
Open Our ApproachEach links to a full editorial answer in the Travel Guide.
The questions travellers ask before trusting us with a private journey.
Yes — UB Hua Zhi Guan International Travel Agency is licensed in Tianjin, with operating history since the early 2010s, ¥150M+ annual revenue, and full Chinese tourism-industry credentials. ChinaTourly is its dedicated inbound private-journey brand launched 2025.
All four partners operate from UB Hua Zhi Guan's Tianjin Tower (Tianjin World Financial Center, Floor 61) headquarters, with regional dispatch coordinators in Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Kunming, Xi'an, and Lhasa.
Founder privacy choice. Full names available in formal contracts and signed booking documents. Surnames only in public-facing brand material — a small concession to the founders' preference for low public profile in exchange for product-first focus.
We're operated from inside China by Chinese partners with direct ten-year supplier relationships, not licensed white-labelled by a Western brand. This affects price (we eliminate the Western intermediary margin), depth (direct supplier means direct master access), and adaptability (decisions made in hours not days).
All private journeys are priced as a transparent total: ground arrangements (lodging, transport, guides, activities) + a ChinaTourly design fee. International flights are quoted separately. Pricing is per-traveler with sliding-scale discounts for groups of 4+. Final pricing arrives within 48 hours of brief.
Yes — we run 7-10 senior-led journeys per year. Pace, altitude, and bed comfort are all tunable. Yunnan terraced highlands, Suzhou canal towns, and Beijing Imperial routes work especially well. Tibet at altitude is the only itinerary we screen carefully.
Yes — China is one of the safest large-country destinations for solo women, with low street-crime rates, 24/7 active urban areas, and English-speaking guides who escort through transitions. We run 30+ solo-women journeys per year.
Yes — we've designed for ages 4-17. The two anchors are pace (max one major site per day, swimming pool every other day) and food (kid-friendly Chinese with backup Western options). Pandas, the Wall, Forbidden City, Suzhou canal pedalos work especially well.
All four covered. We have 6+ halal partner restaurants in each major city, vegetarian-friendly itineraries (especially Buddhist-heritage routes), kosher takes preplanning and we pair with a Hong Kong supplier. Gluten-free we route around rice-noodle staples.
30% deposit confirms your reservation and locks the guide. 40% due 60 days before arrival. 30% remaining due 14 days before. All Stripe / wire-transfer. Cancellation policy is graduated: full refund at 60 days, 80% at 30 days, 50% at 14 days.
Each journey carries 24/7 emergency support. Tier-A hospitals in every major city; English-speaking SOS International members on contract. Mr He is on-call for any escalation. Travel insurance is mandatory and we recommend specific carriers at booking.
Yes. We provide eSIM cards on arrival with bypass capability. Hotel WiFi is universal but slow on consumer-facing platforms. Google/Instagram/WhatsApp/Twitter all require VPN — we set this up before arrival. Apple iCloud works directly.
Yes. All 30+ senior guides are CTC-certified for English language. We tier them by traveller fluency expectation — for travellers wanting deep cultural conversation, we route to our 12 senior guides with university-level English. No exceptions.
Yes — within reason. Pace adjustments, restaurant swaps, optional activity skips happen on the ground via your guide. Routing changes (new city, new region) require 24-hour advance notice and we'll quote any cost difference transparently.
If you came here to evaluate fit, these three pages help most.
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Private journeys through China, crafted by guides who have lived here for decades — we go where the crowd does not.
