I thought I knew how it works.

[danb]

Hello Everyone. I thought I knew how to get a pretty good price for a round trip ticket from New England to Nanning. It is not looking so good this year. I would like to visit Nanning for Christmas. I read how Thomas 2009 got a good price for travel to China in October. I was hoping to find similar prices. So far not even close. I have been checking for prices for about a month and the prices are very high. I have played around with flying out of NYC instead of Hartford. That will save me a little money. I have looked at flights going to Beijing, Guangzhou , Shanghai, and Hong Kong. But then I am faced with getting from the Chinese entry city to Nanning. The prices for the whole trip are a bit too high. About $2000 or over. Have the prices of ticket gone up that much?
In the past I have receive help from Paciasia out of Florida, but it seem to be out of business now. Any suggestions? DannyB

[steveandrong]

I don't know about now, but there used to be this "window of opportunity".....seems that it was like between 4-6 weeks before departure that the tickets would be at their lowest....aty least that was the general rule back when I was commuting back and forth from 2006 to 2008....worked out well at that time...can't remember who told me about that, but I remember it was one of Clark Howards money smart items....can probably look it up to check on that.

[tsap seui]

I always used a 3 to 4 week game plan. Would usually hit a dang good price that only lasted a day or two. As soon as I saw it I would run to my travel agent, tell her what site Isaw it on, and buy it Of course I already had my visa usually, was prepared to pay the going rate if had to and just played a game with the ticket prices. It can be really hit and miss.

 

And you certainly don't need a travel agent to buy the ticket, it only cost me $25, I liked the folks at AAA and they had already gotten me the visa. ...fudging a bit on the "already have travel ticket part."

 

Things have probably changed now with that game, it's been a year since I tried it, but it worked well for almost 6 years.

 

Good luck Dan. I do know that trying to buy a Christmas ticket now is gonna be high, and it may not go down much as you approach Christmas with it being a high flight season. We're talking about going back next May or June and I'm just planning on it being 2 grand each, being in the season, and us wanting to just go to Dulles and fly direct to Beijing on United or their buddy China Eastern.

 

tsap seui

[pbatt]

I have found that 4-6 weeks is a good window for buying a ticket but lately the prices are still high. Christmas is an expensive time of year and hard to find good deals. leaving on Tuesday's or thursday's seems to find me the best prices as well as buying my tickets on wednesdays seems to be the best time of the week to price a ticket and buy one.

 

I have used flychina.com a lot with good luck and also just checking the prices on the airline websites as well.

 

Also changing up the cities you fly from can help. I have a choice of 3 that i fly from and just keep checking for the best fares.

I use elong mostly for my inter China flights.

 

Good Luck and just keep checking.

[fidel]

Ticket prices are seasonal. The summer (now) is the worst time to travel/ buy tickets. Everyone goes on vacation during the summer. Everyone travels for thanksgiving and Christmas. During the fall and spring, no one travels, and ticket prices are low. You'll find tickets for January/ Chinese New Year to be a much better value.

 

If it weren't for our July interview I would have waited for September to visit.

[danb]

Hello all, Thank you for the comments and ideas. Last year I was planning to China at Christmas. Christmas is the normal time that I go. I had started to look at prices a little before Thanksgiving. The prices seem so high and I had an unanticpated passport/ visa issue ( my fault) that showed up at the last minute. I decided not to go and put the trip off until May. I flew into Beijing and stayed in the N.E for about 10-12 days. My Lao Po met me in Beijing. We took a short trip to Shangdong Province. We had a great time. We then flew on to Nanning. My Lao po made the arrangement for all of our Chinese domestic travel. I rented a car for 40 dollars and drove down to JFK. And rented a car for my return trip. I think I may have saved about 200 dollar or more by leaving from JFK and not Hartford. I am thinking that I may have saved some money by having my Lao Po buy the Chinese domestic tickets. Not sure how much by it sounds as if the tickcts may be heavily discounted sometimes if we wait until the last minute.

 

I prefer going at Christmas because I can get 7-9 more days off at that time.

 

In the past I had looked into flying into Hanoi or Bangkok to see if I could save some money. Hanoi is not that far and I would save on a train or bus tickets but the airfare is not that favorable. I even came up with the crazy idea about renting a car and driving a car from Guangzhou and driving to Nanning but I think there are some issues with that crazy idea. I wonder if a train or a bus from Hong Kong or Guangzhou is a feasible idea. I have to find a good balance between cost, time, convience and "do-ability".

 

Tsap, two grand? Ouch!!! I may not have a choice but I would like to get my ticket for less. I found prices would be cheaper if I was able to leave at the beginning of December but I really can't go at that time. I am going crazy searching for a better price by juggling the searches by dates, locations, time, combining alternate modes of transportation,etc. Two of the lower prices that I have found, has me going thru Istanbual or Russia.

 

Danb

[pbatt]

I have taken the train from Guangzhou toYulin which is not far from Nanning. I am sorry I do not remember the price but it was very reasonable.I did have a sleeper car for the journey which was nice. American airlines has a sale starting Sept 1st and flights must be done by Dec 30th on International travel.Good Luck

Edited July 30, 2012 by pbatt (see edit history)

[NickF]

I've ridden the Guangzhou-Nanning a number of times, both hard sleep and soft sleep. As I recall, a couple of years ago hard sleep cost me about $70 US for both of us. Not sure how much it is now. It's about a 12 hour overnight trip.

 

Last time we rode soft sleep; shared with a nice Chinese couple, but you never know who's going to be your roommate.

 

Keep in mind I'm sort of a train freak, so I do this by choice.

[Doug]

I got a 1600-1700 or so price from DFW to Shanghai round trip recently on Delta.com I always put my dates as flexible and then find something I can live with.

[Randy W]

I've ridden the Guangzhou-Nanning a number of times, both hard sleep and soft sleep. As I recall, a couple of years ago hard sleep cost me about $70 US for both of us. Not sure how much it is now. It's about a 12 hour overnight trip.

 

Last time we rode soft sleep; shared with a nice Chinese couple, but you never know who's going to be your roommate.

 

Keep in mind I'm sort of a train freak, so I do this by choice.

 

Yeah, that's about what we paid a couple of months ago from Yulin (it goes through Yulin). It has A/C and is fairly clean.

[dan_ling]

I started looking at DFW to Guilin and found some flights for $,1069 for October, now if that dang 10 year greencard would come in the mail already! Had to play with the dates to find this.

[tsap seui]

Hello Everyone. I thought I knew how to get a pretty good price for a round trip ticket from New England to Nanning. It is not looking so good this year. I would like to visit Nanning for Christmas. I read how Thomas 2009 got a good price for travel to China in October. I was hoping to find similar prices. So far not even close. I have been checking for prices for about a month and the prices are very high. I have played around with flying out of NYC instead of Hartford. That will save me a little money. I have looked at flights going to Beijing, Guangzhou , Shanghai, and Hong Kong. But then I am faced with getting from the Chinese entry city to Nanning. The prices for the whole trip are a bit too high. About $2000 or over. Have the prices of ticket gone up that much?

In the past I have receive help from Paciasia out of Florida, but it seem to be out of business now. Any suggestions? DannyB

 

Dan, for the hell of it as I cooled down from work I just looked up on United's website......

 

Newark to Beijing on December 20th returning January 20th $1,871 No Stops

 

Newark to Beijing on December 26th returning January 20th $1,621 No stops ..........this flight would be $100 cheaper if you stopped in Dulles on the way back and caught a shuttle to Newark

 

Surprising, and in my favor since I fly non-stop out of Dulles. Our prices are $240 cheaper than Newarks price before Christmas and $140 cheaper after Christmas.

 

My flight out of Beijing usually costs $110 to Shenyang and the same on the way back to Beijing. I guess your's would be around the same so you've gotta add another couple of hundred plus to the overall airfare.

 

I've flown into Hartford to teach classes there, unfortunately it's just not international, so you've got to add a shuttle flight onto the tab (as you know) or drive down to Newark or the city.

 

I'm lucky, we're out in the boondocks in the mountains but only a couple hours away from Dulles or Baltimore or Pittsburgh airports.

 

 

Happy hunting

Edited July 30, 2012 by tsap seui (see edit history)

[HongKong2LA]

I don't kow what your schedule is but I've always found reasonable fares in November. A quick search of Orbitz and I found the fares below, granted they're not non-stop and it is Air China (not my favorite to put it mildly) but it does seem reasonable for a fight from Boston to Nanning. Check it out.

 

Your current trip cost

 

Flight Adult: 1 $954.00 Airfare taxes and fees $411.00 Service fee $6.99 Total due at booking $1,371.99

Price Assurance

Additional baggage fees may apply.

 

 

Trip Information

 

 

Flight

 

 

Multiple Airlines

Leave Mon, Nov 5, 2012 Return Fri, Nov 30, 2012

Boston (BOS) > Nanning (NNG)

Nanning (NNG) > Boston (BOS)More Flight Details

[danb]

HI all, I am somwwhat tied to leaving for China somewhere around the 5-7 days before Xmas because I only have so many days left of vacation time this year. I noticed that the prices dip a couple days on Dec 25 and 26. Not much but some but then that means I will cut my stay in China by a week. The prices are a little better at the beginning of December but I just don't have the vacation time available to me. In the years past I had looked in to leaving out of Logan, Albany or Providence but the price difference didn't seem that good. Looks like I will have to consider that option this year.

 

A couple of week ago I googled about train travel in China. I have only very limit experience with that in China. We did take a trip on their Mag-lev (?) train this year when we visit Shangdong province. That was a nice trip. Thoses trains are like the bullit trains in Japan. The article on the internet talked about letters of the different classifications of train travel. It also talked about soft and hard sleepers and seats. I have heard about them but never really knew the difference. The couple of short train trips that we had made in Guangxi Province were not the best. The trains were a bit old and crowded but perhaps that was because of the classification of the trains that we had taken. We had seats but I am not sure if they were hard or soft. Is a hard seat actually a hard seat and made out of wood or is it just a fancier seat and surrounding? I don't know. Danb

[Beachey]

My wife's hometown of Qiqihaer has such limited airplane service that we always took the train. You likely did not take the Maglev but a bullet train which is very nice but not how most of China travels. The Maglev is a demonstration train even faster than the bullet trains going from Pudong Airport to near Downtown Shanghai.

 

As you said there are four classes of service on a normal Chinese train. From most expensive to cheapest:

 

1. Soft Sleeper - they are set up four beds to a cabin with a door that closes. Two up and two down. The down beds are more expensive maybe 50 RMB more than the up one. Dalian to Qiqihaer was around 400 RMB for a 16 hour trip overnight. A couple times we were able to travel with another couple so we had privacy among the four of us.

 

2. Hard Sleeper - I think this is a litlle bit of a misnomer as I don't think the mattress quality is that much different. The difference is there are not individual cabins but aisles with three beds on each side. Six beds to each aisle. Again lower is more expensive than the middle which is more expensive than the top. Imagine troop trains form WWII movies. This was about 200 RMB Dalian to Qiqihaer.

 

3. Soft Seat. This seat is very much like a seat on a Greyhound Bus. This is not bad for shorter trips where you don't need to sleep. Keep in mind this is also the class where they start selling standing room tickets so there can be people standing in the aisles and it can start to get crowded. These seats I think were about 100 RMB Dalian to Qiqihaer.

 

4. Hard Seat - These are more like the seat on a city bus, not very comfortable and where most of the standing room people are. These tickets I think are about 50 RMB for Dalian to Qiqihaer.

 

5. Standing Room - the first time we went to Qiqihaer we took the train there but I insisted on flying back. We had to take a train form Qiqihaer to Harbin and we couldn't get seats so we had to stand for about three hours.

 

I found the train system in China an affordable way to get around though the longest trip was about 16 hours, much longer than that and we always flew. Also there are trains that stop at every station and a few different levels of express that can make a significant difference in travel time. The other thing is the level of English will likely be minimal among the staff. I always traveled with my wife but had friends who managed without a Chinese speaker.