The 4th Kansas City Dragon Boat Festival (NEW DATE)

The fourth annual Kansas City International Dragon Boat Festival will be held on July 26th, 2008!

* Chinese cultural performances are scheduled from 11:00 a.m. to 12:15.
* The Wake the Dragon Ceremony will start at 1:00 p.m.
* Dragon Boat Races will start at 1:15.

The performance stage will be set up near the corner of Wyandotte Street and Ward Parkway. The races will be held on Brush Creek, adjacent to the Plaza.

Learn more here.

On the Road in China

In a seven-part series that aired on Morning Edition, NPR's Rob Gifford set out on a 3,000 mile-14 day trek across China, and discovers just how far the world's most populous nation has to go to catch up with its potential.

Visit www.npr.org and search for "china" to learn much more and listen to excellent news coverage about China's climate, culture, and politics.

Hello future China travelers!

Recently, I journeyed to China and experienced the itinerary for our upcoming September tour first hand. The tour company that we have chosen for our tours, Collette Vacations, was kind enough to send me out ahead of our group so that I could approve hotels, restaurants, timelines, etc.

I will start by telling you that we all have quite an educational, fantastical, jaw-dropping excursion ahead of us. From the eerily beautiful Yangtze river to the unreal Beijing, Chongqing and Shanghai super-megapolises, every moment of this tour will surprise and challenge any preconception that you may have about this huge country.

The hotels are all very beautiful and new.

Shanghai Marriott Hongqiao, Shanghai

Guilin Bravo Hotel, Guilin (my favorite! It is located across the street from a wonderful, magical park)

Grand New World Hotel, Xian

Loong Palace Hotel & Resort, Beijing

The food choices were incredibly varied. My favorite meals were the 18 course dumpling dinner in Xian (yummy monkey-face dumplings!) and the home-cooked family meal in the Beijing hutong.

I am making some changes to the itinerary, but they will not affect any air schedules or hotels. I felt that the tour was too rushed and did not allow enough time at some of the locations where it seemed important to immerse ourselves more fully.

ABOUT THE RIVER BOAT: An important topic that I want to fully disclose to you is the reality of the Yangtze river boat. Collette is using one of the most highly rated cruise lines operating on the Yangtze, “China Regal Cruises”. You can visit their website here: http://www.chinaregalcruises.com/. The staff was wonderful, charming and helpful. The meals were all served buffet style and featured a choice of several entrees, rice, noodles, salads, fruits and desserts. The chef did make some attempts at “western” entrees, but for some reason they all still ended up tasting like Chinese food! There is a wonderful lounge area and library area at the front of the boat which provide comfortable seating and beautiful views.

I do want you to know that the cabins are quite small and have a toilet/shower combo. The beds also seemed to me to be a bit smaller (and harder) than we are used to. However, after a short period of adjustment I found that I was comfortable enough and did enjoy the experience quite a bit. They are all outside cabins and have very large picture windows. There is also a TV (with CNN and Fox news in English)and a phone in each cabin. There are intermittent internet connections available but you should not count on trying to work while on the boat and/or try to read or write emails every day.

If you have cruised on one of the European five star river boats, then I would like for you to know that this is not quite up to that standard. Several seasoned travelers onboard told me that the China cruise ships are very similar to the quality of a Russian River cruise ship. (if that information helps you at all!)

Our Collette Tour Director was wonderful and I am trying to get her assigned to our tour in September. We had one or two local guides with us at all times. Their English was perfect and they were all very knowledgeable about each location.

There is so much more information that I will share with you at one of our pre-departure get-togethers. I don’t have those scheduled yet, but will get those in place soon.

Please know that you are welcome to call or email me if you would like any more specific information about the tour.