Testimonial

Hi Karen

We are back home safely after a wonderful time in China.  We are slowly returning to normal life in New Zealand and have yet to fully reflect on the trip.  With every holiday we have taken there have been things which did not go as well as expected but there is nothing in this trip which would stop us recommending using Chinahighlights to organise it. 
We normally travel in Group tours but decided to try private this time.  We will always do a private tour in future.  It allows you more contact with the tour leader, there is no pressure to move on from one place, you can always hear the leader and also ask questions.  It is the way to go for people of our age group.  It allowed us to change our itinerary to suit ourselves.  For example I was hoping to go and see the Olympic buildings in Beijing and it was easily fitted in.

Seeing the eclipse was one of the major reasons why we chose this year to go to China.  Because of the time of the eclipse it was necessary to check out of the hotel very early and travel to the viewing site.  This was to make sure we did not get held up in a traffic jam and miss the eclipse.  There were busses everywhere. There were lots of cloud which did not allow us to fully see the eclipse.  Unfortunately you could not arrange the weather.  What we saw was incredible. To go into total darkness was uncanny. It was well worth it. 
 
We had three different tour guides and all three were very good, each in their own way. Cathy was bubbly and exciting, Sheryl more professional and the knowledgeable Jack was the last one.  They were all very good in caring for us, answering all our questions and showing us their country.  I would recommend all three of them.  Each gave us their contact phone number and made sure we were enjoying ourselves.
 
We enjoyed all the different meals.  There was always more than enough food for us two and at times we stopped them bringing out more dishes.  Of course the food was different from what we were used to but we still enjoyed it.  Breakfast every morning were more western style and very good.  We felt that the West Lake hotel room was not up to the four star deluxe which it was advertised as.  It had a shower over the bath with a plastic curtain. The bed was just a double in a small room with a stained carpet. Not that bad except it was not a four star.  We had an apartment in one of the hotels because of a mix up in the bookings which was great.  It even had a washing machine so we were able to wash all our clothes.
 
That's it.  Just to repeat that we had a great time, if going to China again would use your services, and we would recommend you to other people.
 
Many thanks
 
John

Dear Sunny,

We are having the best time--enjoying the China tour you have arranged for us!  We are now in Beijing in the charming hutong hotel you found for us.  Our tour guides Tankur and Vivian are the very best-top notch--accommodating our every need.  Tankur is so much fun to be with.  He is very funny and has great stories for us.  He is also very knowledgeable about the history of China and all the temples we have been visiting!  He's also a very good porter!

One of the highlights of our trip has been the 10 km. hike from Jinshaling to Simitai.  Six of us made the trek in 3.5 hours!  We had great views on the 'Wild Wall.'  Today we visited Mutianyu, where my 85 year old mother and my 14 year old daughter were able to visit the wall via the cable car.

All the girls have been enjoying the shopping and have become quite experienced bargainers.  You should see our pearls, jade, cloisonne, and Wii games!

I'm sure you heard about the cloudy weather on eclipse day.  Despite this disappointment, our tour guide Rachel made it a very fun day for us.  The arrangements China Highlights made for all the travelers was great.  We did enjoy the Qiantang tidal wave.  Rachel and I became great friends and had much to talk about.

I can't say enough about how China Highlights was able to organize this amazing trip for our family--10 persons between the ages of 12 and 85!  By the way, thank you for the birthday cake for Mable's 85th and Sarah's 12th birthday!  What a wonderful surprise!  

I will keep you in mind for my next trip to China!  And I will tell all my friends about you!

All my family thanks you for this incredible experience.

Sincerely,
Nancy  Joe

Dear Rebecca,

We have arrived Israel last Wednesday. The trip was really great. I would like to thank you and China highlights team for this trip.

I would like to specially mentioned Nancy our guide in Shangri-la. She was really extra ordinary.

Oded

Virginia:

I did not see a link to answer you questions, but I can answer them right here in this email.  I wrote down the questions for myself on some paper and below are my answers:

I think the Potala Palace and the Terra cotta Soldiers were my favorite cultural attractions, but my highlights were always the nature scenes especially in Qinghai and Tibet.  I loved climbing Mount Huashan in Xian.  I loved all of the rivers, cattle, yak, and sheep herds.  The countryside was BEAUTIFUL!   My biggest highlight might have been this really isolated valley we drove through in Qinghai Province on the way from Menyuen back to Xinning.  It was so deep green and the fork of the Yellow River we were on was really clear and rapid.  That was an unforgettable place! 

All of my tour guides were AWESOME, but I would have to say I really enjoyed Neal and Gina the most because they were the youngest and had the most energy and vitality!  Neal (my Xian tour guide) had a great sense of humor and was easy-going.  He and I got a lot of laughs together and even had some good inside jokes.  He also got me prepared for Qinghai Province which he said was going to be beautiful and he was right.  I really feel like I bonded with my Qinghai guide, Gina.  I will always remember eating mutton and singing songs with her.  She was just an AMAZING tour guide who really had a lot of knowledge about Qinghai Province.  We had fun sharing life stories and talking on the car rides and she even got me a musical gig our first night in Xinning at her school.  We had a blast at Qinghai Lake and she was a very sweet tour guide. 

All of the hotels and meals were fabulous and it would be hard to say which were best.  I really enjoyed the Tibetan steak house and the Islamic restaurant in Xinning that served DELICIOUS mutton!

I totally recommend China Highlights to anybody who really wants to see the 'heart and soul' of China.  I would have been lost if I had not had tour guides to get me out of the cities and into the real depths of the provinces.  All my tour guides were really sweet and showed me some amazing places I would not have found on my own!

No major suggestions for other tourists except that if you do nothing else, see Tibet and Qinghai Province.  Those places are beautiful.  I think I liked Qinghai slightly better than Tibet because it was more 'off the beaten path' and therefore more remote, but very isolated and spectacular just like Tibet.

George

Dear Rebecca,

We just returned from our great vacation to China, and surely our Yangtze cruise was a highlight, not least owing to your outstanding service. Our trip and especially the transfers to and from the ship were totally hassle free. The guides were very helpful and polite. It was no problem to find them, and with the help of our guide we very easily catched the bus to Wuhan in Yichang in time to get our plane.

Surely we are totally satisfied with your service, and even if you would not have sent the evaluation mail, it would have been my wish to express my gratitude for your outstanding organisation. It ensured that our trip was totally a pleasure. We will surely recommend your service to anybody who will travel to China.

We were impressed by the scenery along Yangtze river, and therefore it is difficult to highlight a specific sight. In general, we were impressed by the Chinese culture and by the friendliness of its people. We travelled on our own without knowledge of Chinese, but encountered no bigger problems because of the helpfulness of the people. So perhaps this is what we can say to your potential customers: Don't be afraid of travelling to China, even if you do not speak Chinese and if you do not travel with a group. If one stays in bigger cities and if one relies on the service of a travel agency like yours, than there will be no major difficulties.

Nevertheless, on another trip to China in the future, I would surely rely on your service again.

Kind regards,

Dirk Michael Schulte

Hi Jean,

We enjoyed our trip very much.  Thank you very much for organizing it.  All of the guides were terrific and the service was outstanding. 

The minority villages and terraced rice fields – PingAn and the Dong Village were the most memorable attractions we visited.  These were spectacular.  Also, the Terracotta warriors.

Probably Sean in Beijing was the most outstanding tour guide during our this travel.  Though all guides were great but we especially liked Sean.  He was very attentive and was there when we needed him but also very flexible and looked for what we wanted or preferred rather than feeling a need to stay with a preplanned itinerary.  He also was very good at giving us a little space and privacy when needed.  His style included the needed information, history etc, but was also more relaxed and conversational.  He did not overwhelm us with more facts than we could remember.  There were many more excellent guides but he probably was the best fit for our family.

 
We felt that we may have been too hard on Tang (in Guilin and Yangshaou) than he deserved.  That was early in the trip and I think we were harder in our rating for the first one than for others.  Tang was also excellent and worked very hard to take good care of us.  
And all hotels were excellent.  But we especially enjoyed PingAn Inn and the Hotel in Beijing. Our travel was also excellent, but if we did it again, we would spend more time in minority villages in the west and would not take the Yangtze cruise

Jeff

Dear Sunny,

The travel was very nice and I would like to inform you that the service of China Highlights has been very very professional since the beginning.

Thanks
Manuel

Dear Michael,

We are now safely backed home. We have returned with such a positive impression of China that we have been telling our friends all about it.

We were impressed not only with all the history but also the current economic development that we saw all around.

The Wall of China and the Terra Cotta Army come on top of the list. I would say the Terra Cotta Army is one of 100 places in the world one must see before one dies! We also thought that the TV tower in Shanghai offered a very interesting sight. The Forbidden City was also very impressive.

Each of our tour guide had a side that was different than the others.

Our first guide, Joy was very charming, cheerful. She always had things under control and she went out of her way to organize things that were not on our tour program, such as the Peking Opera. She did not leave us until we were safely in the Opera and made sure we got good seats, as the seats were not numbered. She was also a good guide in the city Adam.

Our tour guide in Shanghai was a very knowledgeable, smart and experienced person. He was also fun and cheerful and a very good organizer. Most of what we learnt about modern China, we learnt from him. Adam is a very intellectual person and it was a pleasure to discuss with him politics, economics, education and health systems etc about China and to compare the situation in our own countries.

Sally, our second tour guide was maybe not so well organized, but her knowledge on history was outstanding. She gave us a lot of important and interesting information about Chinese history, culture and religion. Xian has a lot to offer in terms of history and Sally was very well equipped in that respect.

The hotels and meals were all up to standard. The dumpling banquet in Xian was our favorite! Also, Joy took us to a hotpot restaurant the evening of the Opera which was not in the program, and we liked that very much! Maybe you can add that to your program.

Overall we had a very good, interesting, enriching and culinary trip. The trip was very well organized. I believe having a private tour guide made the trip richer and private transportation made it more efficient. I would especially recommend that.

Thank you for all your help in the organization of this wonderful tour. Our tour guides were the greatest asset of this trip. Without them and their explanations on the history, culture and current life in China, we would not have penetrated China or the Chinese culture and history so well.

All the best,

Gül

Hello Jean,

I trust you had a good vacation.

I want to thankyou for arranging our tours in Chengdu and Guilin. Michelle, our guide in Chengdu was the best guide we have had in China, her English was excellent.

But mostly I want to extend a very big thankyou to your colleague Michael who was extremely helpful when one of our flights was cancelled. He could not have been more helpful or understanding, especially there was no one in our hotel with sufficient English to help us and our Chinese is non existant.

I will be recommending China Highlights very highly.

Yours sincerely,

Thelma Drinnan

Dear Karen:

We have returned home smoothly, we were very impressed with the well organized itinerary, the tour guides, drivers and all the arrangements.  Everything went like a clock!!  .

There is several places that are memorable:  the great wall, the forbidden city, Suzhou was surprisingly enchanting. All of the your guides were not in a hurry and they adapted the pace of my parents. Especially Jay in Beijing and the one in Suzhou, very knowledaeable and friendly.

Every hotel and meal was good.  The selection of food chosen per the tours were my favorite.  The opportunity to eat in restaurants were no tourist is a great idea. We love it!  During the times, that it was a la carte/menu – we like the food – but preferred the other way.

Everything went well. We loved the trip to China and we’ll be sure to recommend your company to others.  

Thank you,

Ivette