We spent spring break in Asia, which means it’s time for a trip report! Join us on part 1 of this adventure to Hong Kong (including Hong Kong Disneyland), Beijing (including the Great Wall), and Shanghai (including Shanghai Disneyland)!
About This Post
A version of post originally appeared in the newsletter. Subscribe to see the latest ASAP. Over the next…many weeks, I'll be sharing my trip report for our recent trip to Hong Kong (w/ Disneyland), Beijing, and Shanghai (w/ Disneyland). These won't be just two entries, one about each of the parks we visited. Rather, they'll be extensive and cover from booking the trip to getting home, including plenty of non-Disney content (for more recent non-Disney stuff, visit Emjoyable Explores). This post covers the planning and booking of the trip.
Booking and Planning Our Trip To Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai
Since Zoe started school, it’s become a challenge to fit Asia travel aspirations into our schedule. Even more so than Europe, the flight times and jet-lag (I got out of bed at 3:30AM to begin writing this) make me prefer a longer trip, but the only truly long block of time Zoe has off school is in the summer. As it turns out, a lot of Asia is notably unpleasant to visit in the summer.
I miss Japan, but I haven't been brave enough to visit in summer
One notable exception is Singapore and nearby Bali, a trip that I originally expected to take this summer. Singapore is the home port of the new Disney Adventure cruise ship. I discovered, though, that the ship’s roller coaster has a height requirement of 120 cm (47.2 inches), so I decided to delay that trip until I can be sure Zoe will be at that mark.
So if summer can’t work, how about spring?
In planning Zoe’s April break, I decided it was feasible to string together Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai over 11 nights. This wasn’t ideal—I knew I’d want much more time in these places than I’d get, and I knew work demands (i.e. time in Disney parks) would only add to that strain. But at some point, you gotta do the thing even if it won't be perfect. I wanted to get back to Asia, and this was a way to make it happen. The kicker was that we’d be booking 15 hours flying in economy both ways.
Unlike some more intrepid travelers I know, I’m a fan of using points and miles to book lie-flat business class for overnight flights abroad whenever possible. My plan has long been to do this heavily in Zoe’s younger years, when sleep was most important, before weaning us off and switching to economy when it was necessary.
Qatar Q Suites
With no good award options available for this trip, now seemed as good a time as any to try ultra long-haul economy (of note, premium economy, with a 2-4-2 seat arrangement and fixed armrests, wouldn’t work since Zoe wouldn’t be able to lie across us to sleep). I booked us three roundtrip economy tickets on Cathay Pacific from JFK to HKG. Zoe would miss one extra day of school before break, which I found reasonable.
One thing you immediately realize when planning 11 nights across five destinations (the three cities plus the Disney parks in Hong Kong and Shanghai since I’d need serious time there) is that you have no days to spare for travel. This is fine, because if there’s one travel thing Zoe and I agree on (and honestly, there might be only one) it’s that overnight trains are awesome. From a scheduling perspective, an overnight train allows you to get between two cities without wasting a day. (It wasn't until picking photos that I realized how much this post focused on sleeping in transit...)
Sleeper Train in India, Udaipur to Agra
From an enjoyment perspective, overnight trains are just super fun—you get to sleep on a train. Zoe had three overnight trains prior to this—one from Udaipur to Agra, India, one from Helsinki to Rovaniemi, Finland, and one from Naples to Milan, Italy. All were good experiences for Zoe (who, in India, notably managed to sleep through the midnight throng of riders attempting to occupy the hallway of our sleeper car while the conductor very loudly asked them to leave).
Overnight trains allowed me to cobble together the following itinerary:
1 night overnight Flight to HKG
2 nights Hong Kong Disneyland
1 night Hong Kong
1 night train to Beijing
1 night Beijing
1 night train to Shanghai
1 night Shanghai
2 nights Shanghai Disneyland
1 night Hong Kong airport hotel
Now…I promise I didn’t look at it in this format before booking it, because I didn’t really internalize that we’d have five consecutive nights of 1-night accommodations, or seven consecutive nights in different accommodations, until we were on the trip. Even for just Emily and I, this would have been extreme.
Altogether, the itinerary allowed one full day in each of Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Beijing, plus an extra day in Beijing for the Great Wall.
You can’t see a city in a day, but one thing Emily and I constantly encountered when we long-term traveled was that we’d arrive in a city, walk around “getting our bearings”, wake up the next morning, and discover we’d already covered most of our must-see list the previous day. We walk fast, eat quickly, and don’t spend a lot of time at sites. I’m happiest just walking around a place (my favorite Disney park activity is to “take a lap”), so one day of that means a lot to me, even if it isn’t “enough.”
Never stop wandering!
Plus, this was a trip to reconnect with these two Disney destinations and “unlock” this part of the world for Zoe. (We use “unlock” any time we try some new travel thing, like a continent, overnight economy, camping, and so on.) My hope for the future is that when either Hong Kong or Shanghai needs to be visited, we’ll be able to pair it with some new city in the region.
Some closing notes on the planning phase of this trip…
Emily and I are still within the window for our 10-year China visa, but Zoe needed one. We could have organized the trip to take advantage of China’s 240-hour visa-free transit, but just getting the visa seemed the better course. We had to fill out the online application and make two visits to the consulate in New York (you can find services to handle the in-person part for you if you don’t have a local consulate), but this went smoothly.
In mainland China, most payments are by WeChat or Alipay. We were able to set up Alipay on our phones before departing, and I’ve never been so ecstatic as when my Alipay worked to buy a tea on the overnight train to Beijing.
I used China’s rideshare app—Didi—once with no problem. There is a special English-speaker-in-China version of the app, and it connects to Alipay so you don’t have to set up a Didi profile or anything once you have Alipay setup. I used my regular Uber app in Hong Kong.
I’m not savvy on matters of eSIMs and such. I just tell AT&T I’ll pay what they want to make my phone work overseas. It turns out their international day pass also avoided the “Great Firewall” in China, so I had no problem accessing Gmail, in particular.
I had a big planning fail. I scored an amazing points deal booking China Eastern with Air France miles. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a way to confirm the booking existed in the China Eastern system (any time you book a hotel or flight other than directly with the hotel or airline, you should confirm the reservation actually exists on their end). Cash rates coincidentally dropped while I was struggling with this, so I chickened out and wound up booking a different flight that also worked better for our schedule. The cancellation fee to get my points back made that option unviable.
That’s all for planning. Next week will cover our flight and arrival in Hong Kong Disneyland!