China Travel Advice

Q: What is the best route to take from Manila, Philippines, to China - we want to go to Qingdao, Yiwu and Guangzhou. Which city do we go first? I also need to know the distances among the cities. Thanks.

Of the three cities in your itinerary, Guangzhou is the southermost, Yiwu is in the middle, and Qingdao is the northernmost. All of these cities are more or less on China's coast (Yiwu is a little inland).

There are flights between Manila and Guangzhou, so you probably should make Guangzhou you entry and departure point.

There are flight services between Guangzhou and Qingdao as well as between Guangzhou and Yiwu; there are no flight services between Qingdao and Yiwu. Flight time from Guangzhou to Yiwu is 1 h 40 m. Airfare is approximately RMB700. Flight time from Guangzhou to Qingdao is close to 3 hours.

There are direct train services between Guangzhuo and Yiwu?there are also train services between Guangzhou and Qingdao. No direct train link between Yiwu and Qingdao. Land distance between Guangzhou and Yiwu is 1,500 km; train travel time from Guangzhou to Yiwu is about 16 hours. A soft-sleeper ticket costs about RMB489. Land distance between Guangzhou and Qingdao is 2,500 km, and the train between the two cities is very long, 28 hours; a soft-sleeping berth costs about 720 yuan.

You can fly from Guangzhou to Yiwu, move on to Qingdao; or alternatively, go from Guangzhou to Qingdao first, stop over in Yiwu on your way back to Guangzhou. Since there is no direct flights between Yiwu and Qingdao, to travel from Yiwu to Qingdao, you can first take a long distance bus to get from Yiwu to Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport, which is a larger airport a couple of hours away, and fly from there to Qingdao. Flight time between Hangzhou Xiaoshan Airport and Qingdao Liuting Airport is 1 h 30 m; airfare is 650 yuan.