My Experience on Budget Travel in China

The highlight of my time in China was most certainly the time spent travelling. Although I lived in Beijing, a city I could never tire of exploring, I wanted to spend every minute of my weekends continually discovering the fascinating country I was living in. My favourite way to end a fun-filled week of the Hello Song, children’s laughter, and lesson plans was to take a Didi (China’s Uber/Lyft), grab my packed duffel bag, and head out on a night train… going anywhere.

Once I discovered how easy and cheap train tickets were, my life was never the same. Through WeChat, the only app you need in China, I could choose to start the weekend’s adventure from any of the five railway stations throughout Beijing or, if I wanted to move even faster than the 215 mph (350 km/h) trains, I could fly.

The first trip I took was dipping my toes into solo travel, and I decided to visit another metropolitan city—Shanghai. Train tickets I browsed and booked during a subway ride to work came to around 75 USD round-trip. My new best friend was a website (not an ad) www.trip.com, which helped me find cheap hostels and hotels during my various travels. A tip I learned from a foreign friend who had lived in China for several years was to ensure the hotel or hostel allowed foreigners to stay, as they are required to register you and not all places can register foreign guests. I confirmed this during my research by checking English reviews from previous foreigners, and it always worked out for me. I’m a hostel kind of person because my time in a new city usually includes: arrive, drop bags, explore, sleep, wake up, and repeat. Hostels ranged from around 5 USD, while private hotel rooms could start as low as 25 USD.

After the confidence gained from my successful Shanghai trip, my next endeavour was to visit a place that had taken my breath away in pictures – the Avatar Mountains. This time I flew into a very small town, spent 6 GBP on a hostel (found through my favourite website), and found myself on the most majestic mountainside I’d ever seen. Interestingly enough, I met another hiker on the trail who was camping and who also worked for English 1 in another city. Such a small world, I tell you.

With a nice train ride, flight, and several hostels and hotels under my belt, I was ready to level up and went to South Korea over a holiday weekend. The flights were shockingly cheap (somewhere around 150–200 GBP round trip, if I remember correctly). I got to experience Seoul and simultaneously appreciated how inexpensive my life in China was as I saw myself spending much more than the 6–25 GBP on hotel rooms.

Later trips included visiting Nanjing on an overnight sleeper (for about 20 GBP), then taking a quick two-hour train ride to the quaint city of Hangzhou (10 GBP), struggling to chat with the gentleman next to me in my very basic but determined Mandarin Chinese. I found that taking Mandarin Chinese study books on the night trains or day trains was a great conversation starter with those around me, who already eyed me curiously. Those simple, kind interactions encouraged me to continue my studies with enthusiasm. Once in Hangzhou, I visited a tea house overlooking West Lake and stayed for less than 15 GBP a night.

Other trips were scattered throughout the year, but the highlight was visiting the Harbin Ice Festival with a group of friends to experience the -30°C Siberian temperatures for ourselves. With several of us travelling together, it was easier to book a four-bedded cabin. Tickets were around 50 GBP and well worth it for the sleep before arriving at the colourful ice castles. We packed into a hotel room, split the 15 GBP per night cost, and instead spent our money visiting every snow, ice and castle.