I have gone on many bike tours before. What are the differences between a conventional bike tour in Europe and a ChinaCycling tour in China?
There are two main differences; one intrinsic to China, and the other intrinsic to what we do. The first difference is that China is a developing country. It lacks infrastructure for tourism, especially in the rural regions where cycling is best. Roads are often problematic, choices of hotels can be limited, and hotel amenities may be sparse or not up to Western standards. For example, in very remote locations, water heaters are turned off when not in use to save energy; if you want a hot shower, you need to wait half an hour until the water heats up. Some hotels have only Asian-style restrooms (although tourism has motivated many to change to Western-style toilets), and you are seldom able to adjust the temperature of your room.
Although large cities have high-quality medical services available at astonishingly inexpensive cost, the medical care outside the large cities is not up to Western standards and many Western medicines are unavailable. We discuss this below.
The second difference is in the emphasis we place on history and culture. In this, we are truly unique. China is more than a wonderful place to cycle; it is a fascinating new world. If all you do in China is cycle, you are really missing out. It’s one thing to cycle to the Dujiangyan Dam World Heritage Site; quite another to