Latest Yunnan Travel Info

In rapidly developing China, it is almost impossible to keep up with the continuous stream of changes relevant for travellers. This section aims to help you a bit in Yunnan.

New cable car above Dali

Overhaul of old Kunming

The last part of old Kunming still standing, often called the Flower and Bird Market, is currently undergoing a major overhaul. So far it is all new shops that have taken over. What the final outcome will be is as yet unclear.

(March 2010)

Renovation of Shiping

The area around Shiping’s Confucian Temple is one place where renovation is done in a stylish way. No kitsch look-like-ancient-china city quarters here occupied by modern clothes and phone shops, but a quiet residential area consisting of preserved traditional architecture. A surprise to find here is the coffee shop of Taiwanese chain Ming Tien. It has style, and a beautiful courtyard garden. West from here old Shiping still consists of untouched streets with a ‘real-life’ atmosphere.

(March 2010)

Train from Kunming to Lijiang

Since last month trains between these places run smoothly, using a new extension of the original Kunming to Dali railway. Departure from Kunming is at 10.00 pm and arrival in Lijiang at 8.00 am the next morning. In the opposite direction times are almost the same: departure 9.55 pm and arrival 7.22 am. Hard sleeper lower berths cost 141 yuan, soft sleeper 207 yuan. Higher berths are as always a very slight bit cheaper. This train also has VIP cabins, at 614 yuan. (Yet another extension of this line from Lijiang to Zhongdian has been approved. At some point it will have to cross the Yangtse River. Will engineers come up with a spectacular bridge across Tiger Leaping Gorge? A high speed rail link between Kunming and Dali is also scheduled. This will be the ‘slowest’ type of China’s high speed trains, doing 200 km/h. Travel time will be cut to two hours.)

(February 2010)

Highway to the Vietnamese border

A new stretch of highway between Mengzi and the China-Vietnam border at Hekou-Laocai has opened, cutting short travel time to/from Kunming with about two hours.

(January 2010)

Yuanyang

• -Entrance tickets to the rice terraces of Yuanyang were introduced last year. Now the system has already changed. Visitors to sunset spot Bada and sunrise spot Duoyishu have to buy a combined ticket of 60 yuan, even if they visit only one of them. Previously there were separate 30 yuan tickets. One week valid 180 yuan tickets are now also available. The ticket for Laohuzui is still 30 yuan, allowing you to walk around the fence that was deliberately built along the road to hide the rice fields from view.
• The village of Duoyishu is currently seeing a major overhaul. All houses are being rebuilt in brick and concrete. Mud coloured paint and thatched roofs are then supposed to give them a traditional look. It works well from a distance. Up close it is obviously fake. But the place maintains its authentic farmer village feel.
  
•  Yuanyang's bus station has moved back to its old location in the upper part of town, after a two year stay in the lower part. Just a dirt yard before, it now boasts a new neat ticket hall, with the usual map, time table and information chart (distances, prices, routes) of Chinese bus stations.
  

(January 2010)

Lüchun

Lüchun has a new bus station, at the eastern side of town just below the main road. The old one is out of service. Electric cars operate as city transportation, official fare is 1 yuan down, 2 yuan up.

(January 2010)

Gejiu bus station

Gejiu also has a new one, at the northern entrance of town on the main road. The old one close to the city centre is also still in use.

(January 2010)

Jianshui

• Pretty 'Double Dragon Bridge' (Shuang Long Qiao) outside town is falling prey to 'developers'. The area around it has been cleared of vegetable plots and it now sits in the middle of an artificial pond. It has lost its real life charm, though for now local people can still cross. Will they continue to be allowed to use it once works are finished?
  
•  Restoration of Zhilin Temple is progressing slowly. At the moment the prayer-hall-turned-office is still there: a peculiar relic of the Cultural Revolution era. It will be restored as just a temple hall. A sign of Cultural Revolution times can be seen in the nearby village of Tuanshan, where revolutionary paintings of that period are being preserved on the inner temple walls.
  

(January 2010)

New bus terminal Kunming

Kunming's New Southern Bus Terminal opened on December 19th. In Chinese it is the Nan Bu Ke Yun Zhan. It's 12 km south of, well, just about anything, in a new zone of Kunming currently being built. A host of city busses serves this Terminal. A taxi to/from the town centre will cost about 45 yuan. A new city raillink is under construction. Busses to all destinations south depart from here, including Xishuangbanna, Jianshui, Yuanyang and the Vietnamese border. The old bus station serving these places (north of the train station on Beijing Rd.) is now only used by long distance busses. You can take 'long distance' literally: busses go to Guangdong and Fujian from here.

(December 2009)