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One of the fundamental rules, perhaps the golden rule when traveling as a backpacker is: spend as little as possible. And in a country named the yellow giant, saving when moving means one thing ... TRAINS. But ... how to book train tickets in China? And how is transportation in China? Keep reading…

Travel by train in China

oops ... what's ours ?!

Almost all our trips have been thanks to this means of transport, which we also have to admit, we love it! Traveling by train has seemed comfortable, fast (considering long distances) and fun: the fact of being able to share your space and your time with local people makes the trip have an added value, without a doubt!

But there are several problems when traveling by train in China:

- HARD WHAT? You will have to decide what type and class of train you want. If you travel at night to save time and money there are 2 possibilities: soft sleeper, where you will sleep in a compartment with 3 other people and the mattress you touch will be softer, or the hard sleeper where you will share your dreams with 5 other people and the mattress is a tougher tad, although in reality we found it very comfortable. Clearly this last option is cheaper.

You will also have to decide whether to sleep in the upper part of the compartment, in the medium or low (the cheapest is the high, which is also very high!).

- BUY THE TICKET. In the stations you will not usually find a tourist office and if you are very lucky the person who will attend you will speak a tad of English, but the most normal thing is that they do not understand you ... solution: in the hostel ask to be translated in Chinese name of the destination , time, day, type of train ...

- DESCIFRA THE HIEROGLÍFICO. Once you have the ticket in hand the riddle begins ... what is that?

this is the jer type-ticket

These are the trains that we have taken with the schedules and reference prices(CAREFUL! The data is from June 2012 and can obviously change!).

LIU ZHOU-ZANGJIAJIE

K-1474 train.
Departure: 21.46pm / Arrival: 8am
Price: approx 106 yuan hard sleeper

ZANGJIAJIE-AN KANG

Train 1608
Departure: 17.30pm arrival: 7.40am
Price: 113 Yuan hard sleeper

AN KANG-XIAN

Train 4908
Departure: 8.10am Arrival: 12.20am
Price: 59 Yuan hard sleeper

XIAN-PINGYAO

Train 2670
Departure: 20.46pm arrival: 6am
Price: 130 Yuan hard sleeper

PINGYAO-PEKIN

1164 train
Departure: 20.46 arrival: 8am
Price: approx 154 Yuan hard sleeper

As soon as the train leaves, the reviewer will come and ask for your ticket. He will keep it, instead he will give you a little card with the number of your place. A stop before arriving at your destination will return your ticket and you will have to hand over the card that left you ... let's go to a human alarm clock!

Travel by bus in China

The other alternative to cover long distances, if you cannot opt for the plane is the BUS. We use it only twice:

Shenzen-Yangshuo

Departure: 16.30 arrival: 5.00am
230 Yuan Sleeper bus

Yangshuo-Liu Zhou

2.30 hours long
60 Yuan a / c bus

on the night bus 🙂

We found them comfortable, clean but compared to the most expensive trains. The urban buses on the contrary, they have seemed super cheap: we are going to have a ticket cost 1 Yuan if the bus does not have ac and 2 Yuan if instead it has it (something like 10-20 cents of €!)

Getting around a city in China

To move around the city there are all kinds of tuk tuk, taxi, rickshaw and although they are not expensive (a trip can cost a eurito or less) we have preferred to walk or in Beijing we have become fond of the subway that also cost 2 Yuan ... Just like in Barcelona!