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Yunnan Jade Dragon Journey

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Detailed Trip Description

Enjoy eleven fascinating days in China’s most picturesque province, Yunnan. Savor the most stunning scenery and most ethnically diverse population in China. Our Jade Dragon Journey itinerary includes Tiger Leaping Gorge, monasteries, colorful markets and homes of the Bai and Naxi minorities.

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Trip Itinerary

Day 1 - Kunming

 
Airport Transfer

Upon arrival in Kunming, you are met by your guide and transferred to your hotel. Meet your group and guides. Kunming, called the City of Eternal Spring, is more than 2,200 years old.

Kunming Airport Transfer picture
Museums

The museum in Kunming provides an insightful introduction to the 25 cultures that live in Yunnan; visit the museum either before the tour or at the end.

Hotel

Stay at a highly favored, four-star hotel. This is a modern hotel with full services located in the western part of the city. Enjoy good food in the city.


Day 2 - Dali

 
Fly to Dali - Erhai Lake - Dali.
Commercial Flight

Fly from Kunming to Dali, a city just opened to foreigners in 1984. Set beside a lake and against a backdrop of mountains, you will see the local agriculture, observe small temples and visit local markets.

Dali Commercial Flight picture
Sightseeing

Visit Dali Ancient City and Three Pagodas, a landmark on a hillside northeast of Dali. The tallest of these ancient temples tops 200 feet.

Sightseeing

In the afternoon, you will take a leisurely two-hour boat ride on Erhai Lake, with a chance to see the fishing junks that play this vast, shallow lake. The smaller junks often use captive cormorants to do the work of fishing, a practice that has been used in China for centuries. While on the lake, visit Putao Bai temple, built on a rock island, and explore a Bai fishing village.

Sightseeing

The Bai, a Tibeto-Burmese people, are one of Dali's dozen ethnic majorities. They make up almost 50 percent of Dali's population and may have settled on Erhai Lake as long as 3,000 years ago. The Dali region has been blessed with a rich agricultural environment and produces good crops of rice, beans, and wheat. It is also famous for its marble deposits, its sturdy breed of horses, its embroidery, and its woodcarving artists. Dali was the capital of the Nanzhou Kingdom during the 8th and 9th centuries and at its height conquered parts of Burma, Laos, and Thailand as well as parts of Sichuan to the northwest.

Hotel

Stay at a 2-star hotel on "Foreigner Street" in Ancient Town. Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner


Day 3 - Dali

 
Dali - Mt. Cangshan - Dali.
Sightseeing

Today you will have the opportunity to take the chair- lift up Mt. Cangshan. You will have chance to enjoy the fresh air and wild life in the mountains and enjoy the birds-eye view of the Dali area. It is a relaxed and happy trek in Cangshan Mountain with waterfalls everywhere along the trail.

Sightseeing

This evening, browse around the ancient part of town on foot. Dali's historic quarter, with its stone houses and narrow streets, offers a rare look into what old China must have looked like.

Hotel

Overnight your hotel. Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner


Day 4 - Lijiang

 
Dali - Liajiang.
Bus

Get an early start for the 5 hour drive to Lijiang today.

Sightseeing

Along the way, visit Chouchen village, known for its tie-dyed fabric weavers. The Stone Bell Hill is an ancient complex of cave grottoes nestled into the shoulder of pine-forested mountains. It is this spot that the monarchs of Dali's Nanzhou Kingdom picked to build their Buddhist temples from the 7th to 9th centuries. Explore the grotto temples and appreciate their fantastic frescoes depicting Nanzhou Kings meeting with Persian envoys with the Indian Buddhist teachers that the kings revered. The frescoes also reveal aspects of Nanzhou life at that time. Lijiang, set at a refreshing altitude of 7,800 feet, is capital of the Naxi Autonomous prefecture. Its charming old center is a world of cobbled streets, canals, and stone bridges that date from the Ming Dynasty.

Food and Dining

Arrive in time for dinner.

Hotel

Overnight at hotel in Lijiang Overnight at a 3-star hotel, the best hotel in town and in this entire area of China. Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner


Day 5 - Lijiang

 
Sightseeing

Lijiang is the capital of the Naxi people, a small but fascinating ethnic minority known for their matriarchal society, their pictographic language, and their distinctive music. They are believed to be descended from the Qiang, a Tibetan tribe that once lived in the northwest mountains of Sichuan, Gansu, and Qinghai. Traditionally, Naxi women have managed trade and commerce, while men have been musicians, gardeners, and child-rearers, and today Naxi society is largely run along those lines. You may be able to recognize the Naxi women by their traditional embroidered capes, blue blouses, and trousers covered with blue or black aprons. The Naxi language is completely pictographic and only Naxi shamans are taught how to write it. Famed botanist Dr. Joseph Rock prepared the first dictionary of Naxi language during the decades he lived in Lijiang and he also became the world's expert on Naxi culture.

Museums

You will visit his old home which has been turned into a museum of his works. Another worthwhile stop is the Naxi Dongba Museum.

Sightseeing

Visit the Black Dragon Pool Park and enjoy beautiful views of 18,000-foot-high Yulong Shan(Jade Dragon Mountain ) reflected in the waters of Black Dragon Pool. Visit Black Dragon Park, explore Lijiang Old Town and the Square Market.

Performing Arts

Attend a concert of traditional Naxi music. The Naxi are the last people in China to play Song Dynasty tunes derived from Taoist scriptures.

Hotel

Overnight at a local hotel.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner


Day 6 - Lijiang

 
Sightseeing

Today, visit the outlying village of Baisha, the old capital of the Naxi, where you can admire the frescoes on one of its ancient temples. There will also be a walk up to the small Yufengsi Monastery, a great center of learning in ancient times, where you will meet members of the Red Hat Tibetan Buddhist sect. Set among hills on the southwest side of Jade Dragon Mountain, Yufengsi is noted for one of its huge camellia trees, thought to be 500 years old and known as the Camellia Tree of Ten Thousand Blossoms. During the Cultural Revolution, a monk saved the tree by sneaking onto the abandoned monastery grounds at night to water it. On the circuit, you also visit Lonquan, a very beautiful traditional village with a small temple.

Food and Dining

Back in Lijiang, enjoy an evening walking tour and dinner in the picturesque central quarter of the city, with its old, wooden Naxi houses.

Hotel

Return to your hotel for your overnight.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner


Day 7 - Lijiang

 
Tibetan Plateau.
Sightseeing

Head further north today, driving though Naxi farmlands and villages and enjoying the extremely picturesque back drop of Jade Dragon Mountain. Tobacco, apples, rice, corn, beans, and sorghum are grown in this region. Visit the village of Stone Drum, or Shigu, at the First Great Bend in the Yangtze River.

Sightseeing

Here you can see the marble plaque shaped like a drum that commemorates a 16th century Naxi victory over a Tibetan Army. Also stop at famous Tiger Leaping Gorge, one of the deepest gorges in the world. The road journey takes you higher and higher. You'll spend some time at altitudes above 9,000' through mixed forest, then up into alpine and rhododendron forests, and then into a rich grassland valley on the Tibetan Plateau.

Hotel

Spend three nights at a four-star hotel in Zhongdian. Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner


Day 8-9 - China

 
Zhongdian.
Sightseeing

Zhongdian is the capital of Dechen Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. It is located in the southernmost part of Kham, or East Tibet, traditional land of the tall, turbaned Khampa horsemen. Today, Zhongdian is principally a Tibetan township but has Han Chinese people as well as a smattering of Bai, Hui, and Naxi minorities. Historically, the town was a trading center between Tibet, Burma, and India. Mule caravans once made journeys to conduct commerce between the regions. One of the major trade items was "brick tea" from Yunnan, in demand by Tibetan nomads and farmers. Spend two days around Zhongdian. Activities include a visit to the spectacular Ganden Sumsanling Monastery, built at the instruction of the 5th Dalai Lama in the 17th century, where more than 800 monks now live and practice. It is picturesquely located on top of a hill and its style very much recalls the Potala Palace in Lhasa.

Sightseeing

Also a visit to the Ringha Temple, with its Five Wisdom Buddhas, built on a sacred hill thought to have healing powers. You can take a walk around the hill and enjoy beautiful views of the Zhongdian valley. On one of the days in Zhongdian, drive to the alpine lake called Shudu for a picnic lunch and a walk around the lake, with its wildflower meadows, grazing yaks, and primary rhododendron forests. From April to September, there are beautiful wildflower displays around the lake, and in October, the autumn colors around the lake make it one of the most beautiful spots in the valley. Meals: 2 Breakfasts, 2 Lunches, 2 Dinners


Day 10 - Kunming

 
Zhongdian - Kunming.
Commercial Flight

Fly back to Kunming.

Sightseeing

Spend the day visiting some of the local attractions, including the Bamboo Temple.

Hotel

Overnight at a 4 star hotel. Meals: Breakfast, Lunch


Day 11 - Kunming

 
Kunming - Onward.
Shopping

In the morning, you will have the opportunity to do some last minute shopping.

Airport Transfer

In the afternoon, you will be transferred to the airport for your onward flight home.
Meals: Breakfast


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Yunnan Jade Dragon Journey
Enjoy eleven fascinating days in China’s most picturesque province, Yunnan. Savor the most stunning scenery and most ethnically diverse population in China. Our Jade Dragon Journey itinerary includes Tiger Leaping Gorge, monasteries, colorful markets and homes of the Bai and Naxi minorities.
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