China Revealed

China is a country on a grand scale, normally necessitating travel by air for the visitor with limited time. However, improved road and rail communications have enabled a new itinerary with overland travel between the ancient capitals of Xian and Peking and through the remote mountain province of Yunnan.The returning traveller has free time in Beijing and Xian whilst the first-time visitor may view the principal sights. Lesser known gems revealed include Luoyang and Anyang, capitals during the Zhou and Yin dynasties respectively; the Buddhist carvings at Longmen Caves, a UNESCO World Heritage site; the Shaolin Temple, home of China’s martial arts. Half the joy of travelling between Lijiang and Dali in Yunnan is the journey through forests against the backdrop of the spectacular snow-capped peaks of the Jade Dragon Snow range. It was here that intrepid 18th-century Western botanists found new plant and tree species, now commonplace in the west including camellias, rhododendrons and tea.

This is the ‘land beyond the clouds’, home of the gentle and colourful Naxi minority people, just one of 24 different minority ethnic peoples in Yunnan, each with their own language, customs, dress and religion, and which are closer to their neighbours in nearby Tibet, Laos and Vietnam than they do to those in ‘Han China’. New for 2011 is the inclusion of cosmopolitan Hong Kong, which is closer to Yunnan than Beijing and offers a contrasting experience. The stay in fascinating Lijiang has also been extended.