Where to combine with Hong Kong at Easter?

[mambojambodothetango]

Booked flights in and out of HK for Easter 26 (12 days total). Current plan is to visit friends using an AirBNB base in HK for some of it (maybe 5 days) but go somewhere else for the rest. Possible destinations we've considered are: mainland China, Vietnam, Okinawa. Not bothered about Thailand or Malaysia (or Macau!) and don't want another long flight.

I've got this romantic idea we can get on a train in HK and explore rural China for a week but have no idea where. We have been to Tokyo etc but would be fascinated to see tropical Japan. Not sure we could do justice to Vietnam in a week but happy to try.

Don't want to be based in a city (though would visit e.g. Hanoi if we did Vietnam) and we like being active so ideally somewhere with walks/hikes and maybe sea but not vital. We will probably spend most of the time in HK sitting around dinner tables with friends so will want to blow away some cobwebs.

Not too keen on resorts.

DC will be 15 and 10.

Thanks!

What about Kyushu? There are direct flights between HK and Fukuoka. From there you could loop around the island. There’s some gorgeous hiking and scenery. We’ve only been to Fukuoka prefecture but definitely want to go back and see more of the island.

Takachiho gorge, Beppu, Mt Aso, Sakurajima, the Kirishima National Park etc.

Think about visas for China and phones working. As well as Okinawa you can fly to the smaller islands like Ishigaki.

Guilin and Yangshuo by train might work for you. You could keep going by train to Chengdu. Then fly back.

Alternatively if you want an adventure you’ve just about got time to get to Lhasa on the train and spend a few days there, if you fly HK to Lanzhou (or some other starting point) and take the train from there. You could start from Chengdu too though that extends your train time. Pls check current travel permit requirements for Tibet as they can be strict. Plus China visas of course.

Flight to Lhasa is also possible of course (usu via Chengdu) but less fun and also less chance to acclimatise to the altitude.

Brilliant ideas - thank you. Keep them coming!

Taiwan? There are some great areas for scenic hikes, if you are into culture then Taipei has a museum with some if the best Chinese artefacts in the world, and food in Taiwan is amazing.

I second Taiwan.. beautiful island.

Interesting. Excuse my ignorance, but is Taiwan easy to get into (unlike China with visas)?

Easy flight to Da Nang in Vietnam from which you can explore Hoi An, which a nice but smaller town.

You could eg fly into Hanoi, and get the train down to Hoi An (or Hoi An to HCMC) if you want to do a bit of land travel.

All good suggestions. I think HK do 2 or 3 day cruises too.

Maybe a boat trip out for a day. Always nice to see the coast from the sea.

Taiwan is visa-free for UK passport holders (for 90 days).

Have they lifted the requirement for going to Tibet where you need a special permit and to be booked onto a specific tour with an approved tour guide and a planned itinerary for the full trip for foreign visitors, then? Can people just free-travel there now? I didn't hear about this!

I’d recommend Lijiang (which featured on a programme with Sue Johnston 15 years ago). It was a complete contrast to Hong Kong and we loved it. Would your DC like to trek with a guide? If you go, try the yak yoghurt - it’s amazing.

I know two people who have had holidays in China this summer. It looked absolutely jam packed. One had a self organized train plus hiking holidays.

If it was me though, I would fly into Kathmandu, and go back to London via Doha or Abu Dhabi

I also loved Taiwan. It’s wonderful. Taroko gorge is beautiful and worth the trip all by itself. I went many years ago and really hope to go back someday.

No complicated visa issues either.

Fabulous. I'm going to look these up after dinner. You're all so kind to share, thank you.

Taroko Gorge has been partly closed since a major earthquake last year, but it sounds like they are working on reopening trails, so by next Easter it may be more accessible again.

Even if not, there are lots of other places to see: Alishan and the sea of clouds, Sun Moon Lake and so on, as well as Taipei and the other cities.

I don’t know the latest. But for many years the ‘tour group requirement’ was a paper requirement only, so while you did need a permit via a tour company you were fine to travel alone when you got there which is what everyone did.

Macau or China. Shenzhen is an easy train ride away and you can then continue exploring the rest of Guangdong province using their trains. Neighbouring provinces like Yunnan and Guangxi have excellent scenery. Taiwan and Japan are great too if you don't mind taking a flight.

I'm getting excited thinking about trains to Guilin - apparently only 3 hours from Kowloon. There are some nice river side hotels and walking/river activities as well as stunning scenery. Would need visas but presumably not that hard to do?

getting a visa for China is a pain imo as you need to go in person to an application centre which can also be expensive depending on where you live.
Guilin is stunning.
personally I wouldn’t risk Tibet as the Chinese authorities have been known to change the rules at short notice. If I remember correctly at one point you had to be part of a tour and all tour members had to have he same nationality..Also it’s advisable to go by train to acclimatise and that may take too much time out of your itinerary.
personally I love Vietnam.
i lived in China for 12 years and rural China is not my preferred holiday!

Came here specifically to say Taiwan! Incredible food, beautiful country (it's got it all from gorges to lovely beaches) and very easy to navigate using public transport

My China visa from London took three weeks (plus a visit) this year, so allow plenty of time.

That’s after they introduced a new centralised online system, which seems much slower.

(It used to be the case that you could get a China visa in HK very fast, but I’ve just seen they are now on that same system so I would not count on that).

Taiwan is amazing to live in, but I wonder if it might be underwhelming as a tourist (?). Not many iconic sights and I personally would rate the scenery as less striking than HK or, say, Guilin. Very happy to be told I’m wrong on this. Could be a fun weekend trip for night markets and 101 and the palace museum.

Shanghai?

I loved it as a tourist. This was back in around 2011, I think. We loved the museums, the architecture, the temples, the buzz of Ximending or the night markets in the evening. We had some lovely day trips out into gorgeous nature. The food was great, the public transportation was excellent and it felt clean and safe. I’ve never understood why it isn’t more popular with tourists. I’ve loved Hong Kong and Japan too, but Taiwan exceeded all my expectations and blew me away.