Current travel expenses-estimates sought!

[xuexiansheng]

I'm planning on a trip to China in March of 2012. I've done the big cities, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, so I'll be traveling in smaller (for China) cities, like Wuhan, Changsha, etc., maybe planning a boat trip down the Yangtze River. If I'm traveling alone, paying for mid ranged hotels, not eating too fancy, and doing a little light tourism, what would be a good estimate of how much I should budget per day or per week? And I've looked at pricing for flights to Shanghai from Portland, OR, USA (homebase) and they seem to be running around 1K$, sound about right? Anyone with suggestions, they would be welcome!

Thanks to all who've been back more recently that I have (I haven't been back to China since I studied for a year in Hefei in 2005) and can give me a good estimate!

PS-I have decent language ability and am fairly travel savvy, age 32, if that factors into anything.

[WestTexas]

Depends hugely on how good you are at finding deals. Like, I can usually find hotel rooms for 50RMB a night in smaller towns, but some people will book online and pay 200 per night. Really my tip would be to not book online for the hotels, you will almost always get a worse deal than just walking around looking for scuzzy places where you could stay. Food is another one too... if you are okay wandering down some back alleys you can be eating good for less than 20RMB a plate, but if you want to eat at nice places close to tourist spots you could be looking at 50-100RMB easy. To say nothing of ridiculous hotel buffets charging you 200+ a person (never been to one of those). I just re-read your post and noticed you said 'mid-range' hotels. I think 100-200 per night should cover you there. I stay in the cheapest places possible, but my friends who don't pay 100-200 per night.

Personally I would say I'm a *very* savvy traveler as far as China goes and I wouldn't budget less than 200 per day. 500-600 per day would be the top limit, you would have to be irresponsible, dumb, or have no language skills at all to spend more than that. Or just not trying to save money, which can be nice to do while on vacation.

As for the river cruise, I took one of those. Chongqing to some small town. It was 400 RMB for a four day cruise, in a shared cabin. That was like two years ago though, maybe prices are up. It was a Chinese cruise and I was the only foreigner on board, so obviously no English tour guide or anything. Oh yeah it was in the winter too, so maybe that made it cheaper.

[xuexiansheng]

@WestTexas

Thanks, that was exactly what I was looking for!