Testimonial

Elaine, Let me start off again with how wonderful our trip was. I don't think we could express enough our thanks for helping us put together the trip of a lifetime. I am happy to answer your questions, but let me start off by telling you how happy we were with China Highlights and the entire staff. While we were pleased with our tour guides, Gillian and I wanted to pass on a very special thank you to Alley in Beijing. She was brilliant! This trip was for our 20th anniversary and we could not have had a better experience. Thank you for a wonderful experience and the next time we visit China we will certainly be using China Highlights. Robert and Gillian

Hi Sunny, Thank you for your email. We are rested after our long trip home and enjoying sharing stories from our wonderful trip with family and friends. I have given your name and China Highlights website to a few people that heard me talk about the trip and wanted more information. It was a good idea to give us "homework"—the evaluations at each phase of the tour, so that we could document our reactions while it was fresh in our minds. Our thoughts changed as we gathered experience at each new stop. We tried to rate the different sites honestly on their interest and value to us personally and hope that did not in any way reflect adversely on the wonderful efforts of our gracious tour guides. What follows are our answers to your evaluation questions: The best thing about our trip was how smooth all arrangements went for us. We truly appreciated and admired the efforts made by Sunny, our wonderful tour guides and all the China Highlights/CITS staff to provide us consistent reliability every day on our tour. It is wonderful to be met, not only by a smiling friendly face at each new city, but also by the capable guide and driver that we will be touring with during that stay. This adds a priceless feeling of being welcomed and secure. We also appreciated how hard Sunny worked with us during the planning stages to not only offer suggestions but also to meet our requests and changes. She was very dependable. The tours were well organized. We appreciated being dropped off on one end and picked up at the other after a long walk. There were three special "surprise" tours that we didn't have much prior knowledge of and thoroughly enjoyed—and highly recommend.

1. The wonderful Tanzhe Temple outside Beijing (but do let clients know there is climbing and numerous stairs involved).
2. The exceptional Hubei Provincial Museum in Wuhan with thousands of exquisite artifacts excavated in 1978 from the tomb of Zeng Hou Yi. We also enjoyed the performance of chime bells, stone chimes and other ancient instruments. The museum is being expanded and is a must see! (Open 8:30am-5pm; Chime performances at 10a and two other times for a separate charge of 30RMB.) They do sell one book in English about the museum collection.
3. In Guangzhou we didn't want to see any more temples or hills, so Lucia took us on a delightful walk after lunch through the legendary Qingping Market with multiple shops of Chinese medicines (including live scorpions!!), spices, fish, pets, and flowers. We also walked on to Shamian Island along the Pearl River, the colonial area developed in 1843 by the British. The architecture is very European and worth seeing.

Hello Mr. Morgen The trip was wonderful and went very smoothly. Thank you for all your help setting up the details! See my answers below to your questions. I appreciate the opportunity to provide feedback. The best part of the trip was the hiking in Huangshan, especially along the river where it was peaceful and in the areas of the mountains where there were not a lot of tourists. The hike along the river allowed us to see authentic villages that were not filled with tourists. Jason was a great tour guide who knows the area well, and always took the extra effort to make sure our stay was pleasant. Guilin was beautiful. Clive was a great tour guide and was very good at making sure we get free time to ourselves. There were some really good restuarants. We really enjoyed the restuarants where we were allowed to choose our own food, such as McFound's in Guilin, or the restuarant on Tunxi Street in Huangshan where we get to see what we are choosing. Thanks again Mr. Morgen! I will highly recommend China Highlights if anyone I know wants to plan a trip to China. This has been a great experience. Best regards, Melody

Dear Elaine, I wanted to say that I am very grateful to you for making their visit to one of China's greatest cities a genuine highlight of their trip. You (and their tour guide) really lived up to your company name. Best regards Emma

Hello, Sunny, Thank you for your inquiry and follow-up. The requested responses are below in this e-mail. I appreciate your part in making my brief stay in Hong Kong relaxing and enjoyable. The best thing: The welcoming of the guide at the airport, and steering us to the hotel, then later, the brief tour of the city. It was a relief not to have to arrange all those things for ourselves after a long, tiring flight. It gave us a chance to become familiar with our surroundings before branching out on our own. The guides also answered questions and offered suggestions when we told them what we planned to do independently. Even as we were being escorted to the airport as we were departing, the guide was providing information and knowledge that we took with us. China Highlights was very helpful from the first Internet inquiry, through planning and hotel selection, constantly keeping in touch with rapid replies to e-mail. I received friendly and professional service throughout the short tour we requested that covered the highlights, and it was good to have the guide see that we got to the right place at the airport at the right time. Everything I wanted and requested was provided with cheerfulness and efficiency. Beverly

Hi Sunny, Here are some comments: We had a very good experience with China Highlights. My wife and I paid for a deluxe tour, with private guide and driver. Everything went very smoothly. The people in China were polite, and we sensed no bias against foreign tourists. People in crowds and queues can be physically pushy, but they do this to everybody, including other Chinese, so don't take this personally. Very few people speak English, although all of our guides and most of the hotel staff were fluent. The guides and drivers were always on time and courteous, and our accommodations were exactly as expected.? We stayed at the Peninsula Beijing hotel, which was very comfortable (check out the 42 inch plasma TV), and had an excellent breakfast buffet. We saw the usual sites around Beijing,and all of them are worth seeing. We also took a cruise on the Yangtze River from Yichang to Chongqing on the Victoria Katarina. The ship was very nice, and looked to be the best of all the cruise ships we saw on the river. We upgraded to a Shangri-La suite, which I highly recommend if you can afford the premium price -- we paid an extra $300US per night for it. The Katarina has only two of these suites, which are located at the front of the second deck. Each suite is a studio apartment with five large windows, a jacuzzi tub, and (best of all) access to a large private balcony that covers the entire front of the second deck. Since no one rented the other suite, we had this entire balcony to ourselves. Very nice, indeed. All of the shore excursions were well-organized and worth doing. Be sure to see the panda exhibit and Gooseneck Park in Chongqing. Overall, we had a very good experience, and we highly recommend China Highlights for your China tour. Mark Armerding

I think China Highlights have arranged everything very well. Well done! Learning about chinese history, visiting each unique place of interest (I look forward to every single day of the tour while I was there) and the food arranged for us were good and clean. (we did not suffer from any stomach problems, I was impressed). I also enjoyed visits to the silk, jade and coloisse factory. Perhaps, places like Forbidden city and Summer palace, travellers should allocate a day each to those attractions so that they can see more sections and if there is any remaining time, then probably include other city sights so that travellers get the whole picture of Beijing (both historical and modern bits). Travellers should definitely visit the Great wall, Forbidden City, Summer Palace and temple of heaven. I think that beijing has too many things to do and see, if they want a proper visit, they should definitely go for a 5 day or a week tour! Westerners should probably visit the markets in Beijing (it will be an eye-opener for them!). Also, Phototaking, it is best to take it in the morning (maybe arrange all the top attraction visits in the morning).

Morgen, in reference to my recent excursion to Huangshan, I (and Adrian) want to thank you and your company for your expertise in providing an excellent trip. Everything went to perfection – great guide (Gerry), great trip! Thank you. I will have no doubts when I recommend you and your company to any similar holiday. I can only hope that one day I can return to your beautiful country.

Morgen, in rereading my journal of the trip, I was reminded of many interesting times and experiences. Overall, we all thought that China Highlights provided us with excellent service which enhanced our visit. I have recommended you and China Highlights to several friends already. I would not be surprised if you hear from some of them in the near future. As you might guess, I'm not a professional photographer by any stretch of the imagination however, I do have some photos that may be of interest to you. If so, I'll happily forward them to you. The best thing of my trip: Our favorite city was Guillin. This is a beautiful city with many things to offer. Our experience was enhanced tremendously by our guide, Grace. Guillin provided us with the most varied experiences and best food. Especially enjoyed the visit to Dragon's Backbone. The highlight here was of course the scenery, but I found the village fascinating. I would recommend more opportunities to get to know these people. 0ur group also enjoyed Suzhou and Michael,our guide. In Suzhou, one of our group was ill and Michael went out of his way to make sure she was taken care of. This is a big plus.

The guide assigned to me in Shanghai, Vivaldi, was outstanding. His knowledge of the history of China was great. His enthusiasm added to his guidance. I was interested in a particular site in Shanghai. I am Anglican Christian. The former Anglican Cathedral in Shanghai is presently being used as headquarters for the Three Persons Movement (general Protestant Church in China). I had read in our Church publications that it was being renovated by the government. I was interested in seeing it. Overnight Vivaldi looked up its location and made time to get me there and to see the exterior of the buildings. He is to be commended.