7 Days Whole Shanxi Classical Tour

Arrive Datong, our guide would meet you at the airport or railway station and transfer you to 4* Datong Hotel. Our guide would help you check in and you would enjoy the leisure time in the rest of day on your own arrangement.

Our guide would meet you at the lobby of hotel at around 09:00am, then drive you to visit Yungang Grottoes which is one of four large grottoes in China. Then drive you to visit Huayan Temple with murals and many statues inside and lots of them have over 900 years history. The most famous statue is a female sculpture which casted in Liao Dynasty (907-1125) and people normally evaluated her as the Orient Venus.

Remark: We only include two attractions in one day trip as we would like to give you more flexibility to choose where you like to go in the rest of the time or just take a rest inside the hotel. There is no much more to see inside Datong city, if you'd like to explore more, we recommend Shanhua Temple for you to consider as option. As Shanhua Temple kept relative complete Tang Dynasty Style Architecture inside. If you have leisure time in the evening, you can consider going out and take a look of the Datong City Wall although it is newly built. But the night view is amazing and photogenic.

Our guide would meet you at the lobby of hotel at 08:30am and drive around 2 hours (75km) to visit Hanging Temple firstly, it called as the world's forgotten wonders as it built on the cliff with 1,400 years history. When you stand on the temple and see the Aeolian bells swing in the wind, you would appreciate the passage of years. A simple lunch would be served at the restaurant near the scenic spot, then we drive you 1 hour to visit Yingxian Wooden Pagoda which is the oldest and the highest surviving wooden pagoda in China but without using even one spike to build it. That's why we called it's architecture wonder in the world. Then we would drive you 1 hour to Yinshan Village to have a walk on Guangwu Great Wall. The Guangwu section of the Great Wall stretches more than 6 km. Great Wall fans love the section because it has retained the original look of the wall without renovation since it built in 1374. We don't spend much time on it, just walk on the main towers on it, take a picture and then we go down and continue our 2.5 hours driving to Taiyuan City. If you like, we would drop you off at Liuxiang Snack Street. Our guide would give you some suggestions about where you can find the nice cuisine. You can try the food there and go back to your hotel by taxi. We also can drive you directly back to the 4* Shanxi Grand Hotel in Taiyuan City – The Capital City of Shanxi Province without stop in Liuxiang Snack Street if you are too tired after great wall climbing. 

Our guide would meet you at the lobby of hotel at around 10:00am, then drive you to visit Jinci Temple which is the earliest royal garden in China which is still well-preserved. The history is much longer than the royal gardens in Beijing. And there are several old trees with over 1000 years history, and the whole environment is quite tranquil and peaceful which is not easy to find in China. After having lunch at Taiyuan city. We would drive you 50 mins to Chang Family Compound which has the largest scale among all Shanxi Merchants, and it is also the largest architectural complex in manor style. After that, we drive you to stay at Pingyao Ancient Town. Enjoy leisure time inside Pingyao Town on your own arrangement.

If you like, our guide would meet you at the lobby of hotel at around 06:15am, getting up early it would give you a chance to see a quiet and peaceful Pingyao Ancient Town as most of the Chinese tourists group would start trip at around 0700am gradually. Except the noisy and commercialize atmosphere in the daytime, Pingyao Ancient Town show her serenity in the early morning. Before all the shops opened, before the loudspeaker start to work for the hordes, you would see a lovely Pingyao Ancient Town, you would have chance to hear the peddler's yo-heave-ho (they might probably sell local breakfasts), old people talking with their neighbor, or just the blooming of the jujube tree, would bring you a quite different feeling in this thousands of years history town. As today's trip is not so packed, so we can back to hotel to take a rest for around 2 hours including breakfast’s time. Then we depart from hotel at around 10am, drive to visit Zhenguo Temple firstly, you would find that's an undiscovered gem which forgotten by local people and tourists, here you can appreciate the old Chinese architecture and amazing painted sculptures & frescos with above 1,000 years history! Then we drive you to visit Shuanglin Temple. When Pingyao Ancient Town applied to be UNESCO in 1997, the government used one town  -- Pingyao Ancient Town and Two Temples – Zhenguo Temple and Shuanglin Temple to pass the application, so these 2 temples are both you should not miss. And Shuanglin Temple with 1,400 years history which a bit longer than Zhenguo Temple and famous for it's painted sculptures, the more stunning feature of Zhenguo Temple is it's architecture. After lunch, we would drive you to visit Liangcun Village, a sinking village which has many famous merchants hundred years ago, their houses is still inside the village but the host has changed into poor people. Now Liangcun Village is one of the poor villages near Pingyao Ancient Town. By visiting this village, you can see the rise and decline of the life. Then we would drive you back to hotel for take a rest, re-start to go out and visit Rishengchang Former Bank inside Pingyao Ancient Town. Our guide would give you introduction about the former bank so that you would have idea that how Pingyao became so influential and wealthy from the trade and banking. Then we would drive you back to hotel, enjoy the dinner and leisure time on your own.

Our guide would wait you at the lobby of your hotel at 08:30am and drive 2.5 hours to Feihong Glass Tower (The Flying Rainbow Pagoda) in Hongtong County. It is the largest existing well-preserved glazed tower and also the one of the four existing ancient pagodas in China. It was firstly built in Eastern Han Dynasty but was rebuilt in Ming Dynasty (1516-1527) which cost 12 years to complete it. The body of the pagoda is as colorful as the rainbow after the rain so it has the name. You would find that is a stunning beautiful pagoda when you stand in front of it. As climbing the tower is unpermitted, so we would spend around 45 mins for taking picture of the tower and visit the Guangsheng Temple below the tower. Then we drive you to have lunch at Hongtong county. After lunch, we depart to Hukou Waterfall at around 0100pm and spend 2.5 hours on the way. We would arrive Hukong Waterfall Scenic Spot at around 03:30pm. It calls Hukou as in mouth of the teapot and hence the tremendous gushing of the water as the Yellow river forces its way into this narrow opening. It is the only yellow waterfall on the yellow river in the world. The Chinese call the Yellow River as our Mother River, as the river flows downstream to the various provinces to provide irrigation for the paddy fields and farms, for feeding millions of people. If you are in good luck, you would see the spectacular view after heavy rain. We would have dinner inside Hukou Waterfall scenic spot at around 05:30pm (dinner cost is on your own pay on spot). Then continue to drive you 3.5 hours to Yuncheng City. You would stay at 4* Tongbao Gloria Grand Hotel in Yuncheng City.

Day07 Depart from hotel at 09:00am, our driver would drive you 1 hour and 45mins to Macun Village in Jishan County, visit Macun Brick Engraved Tomb which you even cannot find any information online. The graves are belonging to a medical family which flourishing in 960-1230. It has over 900 years old history. Although the tomb are not belonging to influential officials or royal family, the brick carving is very delicate and the mural on it reflect the local people's life and the prosperity of the culture at the same time. In one of the tomb, the brick engraved delicate pictures which reflect the traditional opera's prosperous at that time. There is even no tourists to visit this attraction, that's China Adventure Specialist' secret recommendation but you would not feel disappointing. We would drive you to Yongle Palace (around 2 hours driving distance). Before arriving Yongle Palace, we would arrange lunch at local restaurant for you firstly. Yongle Gong temple, also known as the Palace of Eternal Joy. The murals painted inside the halls of Yongle Palace, cover more than 400 square meters, depicting a grand scene of congregation of Taoist saints and more than 280 other figures. The figure painting has an ethereal style which was passed down from Wu Daozi (AD 680-759), an artist of Tang Dynasty. Art critics and historians have called the 960-square-meter frescoes in the palace the greatest of mural painting in China.

Note:

You trip would be end at around 0430pm-0500pm. Then we would deliver you to the railway station and take the bullet train to Xian or Taiyuan.

Instruction about the transportation departs from Yuncheng:

1)    If you don't consider having dinner at Yuncheng City, you can consider taking the train D2565 (17:17pm/18:36pm) to Xian North Railway Station.

2)    There is bullet train between Yuncheng and Beijing, but no one after 0500pm. You can consider taking the train to Taiyuan city firstly, then connect the train back to Beijing. Or stay one more night in Yuncheng City and take the morning bullet train back to Beijing next day.

3)    There is one train which matches with your schedule back to the capital city of Shanxi Province. That's D5322 (17:36pm/19:48pm).

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