Why can't I book this yet?

Because three of the ten days are not contracted. Suzhou and Hangzhou have no ground handling on our side: no vehicle, no guide, no admissions, no hotel. We are not going to sell you four days we cannot deliver, so the route takes no orders and no deposits until both cities hold contracted, bookable ground handling and are named in the inclusions. Everything in Shanghai and Shenzhen, and all three intercity legs, are settled and written out above. Tell us your dates now and we will write to you on the day the route opens.

Will the driverless taxi actually run on my day?

It is a public service run by an operator on real city routes, and we book it against your date in advance. We cannot guarantee it, because whether the service runs that day is the operator's decision, not ours. So we recheck your order before you travel and tell you the result in writing; if it will not run, the ride comes out of the plan and its amount comes off your order. What holds either way: the Huaqiangbei walk the same day, with your guide reading the market floor by floor, and the planning hall the next day, neither of which depends on an operator.

I hold a US passport. Can I do this route?

Not this one. Shenzhen currently has no direct air service to the United States, so a route that ends in Shenzhen does not stand for US guests, and we do not sell it to the US market rather than quietly leaving you to solve the flight home. If you want this subject matter, tell us and we will say plainly what a version on a different departure gateway would take: it would be a different product and would go through compliance review again.

There's no Great Wall on this. Is it worth ten days?

It depends on what you came for. This route is built for looking at how the country works now, so it spends its time on the things that are actually running: a market that supplies factories, a car on a public driverless route, a company's own shop floor, a hall that keeps the record of a city's plan. Behind all four sits the older Shanghai the money for it came through. If what you want is the first-trip set, the Great Wall, the Terracotta Warriors and the pandas, say so and we will point you at the routes that carry them.

How do I get home from Shenzhen?

Shenzhen has full direct service to France, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. It has full direct service to Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece as well. If that is your way home, the airport drop-off on day ten is in your price. Direct points out of Shenzhen are limited for the UK. The same holds for the Nordic countries with Central Europe and Ireland, and for Canada with Australia and New Zealand, so we check the timetable for your exact departure date before you book. Where nothing suitable flies, your order leaves China through Hong Kong or Guangzhou instead: the overland crossing to Hong Kong runs about 40 to 60 minutes, we book it on request, and it is quoted separately rather than folded into your base price.

Made Here | LyrikTrip

Overview

Most China routes put the new part at the end, as a coda. This one gives it three nights and a whole city. You start in Shanghai, where the old walled quarter, the plane-tree streets of the former concession and the towers across the water are all within one afternoon of each other. Then the route runs down the delta by rail, and finishes in Shenzhen: a market sorted floor by floor into components, prototypes and finished machines, a car that drives itself along a real operator's route, a hall where the city keeps the record of its own forty years. By the last morning you'll notice you have stopped calling any of it futuristic, because you watched people make it.

— LyrikTrip travel designers

Every LyrikTrip journey begins with a conversation. Tell us your dates, who is coming and which passports you hold, and we check the visa window and the Shenzhen departure timetable for those dates before anything else. First reply within four hours; a clear price for your dates within one business day. On this route we will also tell you plainly where the Suzhou and Hangzhou ground handling stands, before you are asked for anything.

Why you'll love this trip

The country at work. Bund towers, a commuter ferry, an electronics market, a drone showroom, with English-speaking guides city by city.
10 days from a rowing boat on a canal to a car with no driver. See who builds it.

Ride a rowing boat through a canal town on the last Shanghai morning, then walk over the arched stone bridge you passed under: the water and the bridge were the whole transport system here, and both still work.
Stand on the Bund after dark with your guide beside you: the old waterfront buildings hold one bank, the Pudong towers hold the other, and the city is looking at itself across the water.
Cross the Huangpu on the boat people take to work, standing at the rail with commuters and their scooters rather than on a sightseeing deck.
Get into a car in Shenzhen with nobody in the driver's seat and watch the wheel turn itself through traffic. The ride is included in your price; the operator, not us, decides whether the service runs that day, and if it does not, the amount is deducted from your quote.
Explore Huaqiangbei floor by floor with a guide who can read the building for you: loose components on one level, prototype boards on the next, and finished machines above that.
Read a city's own account of itself at the Shenzhen planning hall, in models and maps, on the ground the account is about.
Unpack twice in ten days: three nights in Shanghai at the start, three nights in Shenzhen at the end, with the middle of the route moving by high-speed rail rather than by airport.

Things to do

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Itinerary

Arrivals

Shanghai · Day 1 - Day 3

Day 1 · Land in Shanghai

Your driver meets your flight, whatever time it lands. Nothing else is asked of you today.

Airport pickup Your driver and vehicle are waiting for the flight number on your confirmation, and the run into the city is yours to sleep through.

Shanghai through the window The elevated road comes in over the roofs, and the towers on the far bank show up before you have unpacked anything. The city you flew to arrives first as a shape at the end of a ramp.

Evening Nothing is scheduled. Your guide is reachable, and dinner near the hotel is recommended and booked for you if you want it, on your account.

Day 2 · The old city, the objects, the river

A Ming garden in the morning, a floor of bronzes after lunch, two skylines after dark. Day two puts four hundred years of the city in order before you have to think about it.

Yu Garden and the old city Pavilions, rockery, ponds and a path that never runs straight, set in the oldest quarter of Shanghai. Stand before the Yu Ling Long, the perforated limestone around which the garden was arranged, and look through it: the holes align, and the pond appears on the other side.

Shanghai Museum Your timed slot is booked ahead by us, so you walk in on schedule. Inside, the collection is laid out by material: bronzes, ceramics, painting and calligraphy, decorative crafts. Take the bronze gallery first and follow one vessel shape along the wall: the same object gets thinner, then plainer, then decorative, across several centuries in twenty paces.

The Bund after dark The old bank and customs buildings line the west bank, while the towers of Pudong rise on the east, and the two face each other across the water. Your guide stays with you throughout the evening. Stand at the railing on the west bank and film fifteen seconds across the river: that shot captures the entire trip in a single frame. Gazing at both banks at once, you'll feel the ten days fall into place as one coherent story.

Day 3 · Under the plane trees, then across the water

A low, quiet morning in the streets the towers never reached. The afternoon crossing is the one every local makes.

Former French Concession and Wukang Road Plane trees closing over the street, historic residences behind their gates, small shops at ground level. Look up at the corner of Wukang Road where the building comes to a point like a ship's bow, then look back down the street: the whole block stayed the height it was built at.

Huangpu River ferry You cross the river on the public ferry the city takes to work, at the rail with commuters and their scooters, not on a narrated deck. The crossing is short, and the far bank comes up fast: the towers you were looking at from the Bund last night are suddenly directly overhead.

The rest of the afternoon Kept light on purpose, with the vehicle and guide staying with you. The Shanghai Tower observation deck sits on the Pudong bank if you want to add it; it is quoted separately when you choose it and is not part of your base plan.

High-speed rail

Suzhou · Day 4

Day 4 · A canal town, then the train

The last Shanghai morning goes to the water it was built on. By mid-afternoon the delta is running past the window.

Zhujiajiao by rowing boat An hour west of the centre, a canal town of stone bridges and lanes that stop at the water's edge. You sit low in a rowed boat while the boatman works a single oar over the stern, and the bridges pass over your head one at a time.

Kezhi Garden and Fangsheng Bridge Kezhi Garden is one of the town's private gardens, built for a family who wanted to study and farm on the same plot, as its name suggests. Then you walk up Fangsheng Bridge, the town's high arched crossing, and stand at the top: the canal runs off in both directions under the roofline.

High-speed train to Suzhou Your vehicle takes you to Shanghai station in the early afternoon, and your guide sees you onto the train. Second-class seats are included in the base price, and the cabin class for your booking is specified in your quote before you pay. It is a short leg: the delta outside the window is flat, wet and worked, with water in every field.

Arriving in Suzhou The Suzhou ground arrangements are not contracted on our side yet, so the transfer, the guide, the admissions and the hotel night here are not part of this plan and not in your price. This is one of the two reasons the route is not open for booking.

High-speed rail

Hangzhou · Day 5 - Day 6

Day 5 · Down the delta

A rail day through the country that grew rice and silk before it grew anything else. The two cities in the middle of this route are the reason its two ends make sense.

Suzhou and Hangzhou, day plan not contracted Told straight, neither city has contracted ground handling on our side today. Nothing here is named as an experience, sold as a highlight or priced into a quote. The route structure holds the two cities because the delta they sit in is where the wealth that built old Shanghai came from, and because the way this region has always dealt with water is the same instinct that later filled in a coastline to make Shenzhen.

High-speed train to Hangzhou The second of the two rail legs, second class, in the base price. The cabin class for your order is written into your quote before you pay.

What is fixed today The rail leg itself and the seat on it. Everything else on this day is named in your written itinerary only once the ground handling here is contracted, and until then we do not sell it to you.

Day 6 · A day in Hangzhou

The slowest day of the ten, and the one still being built on our side. What sits here is honest about itself.

Hangzhou day plan not contracted Hangzhou ground handling is not contracted, so this day carries no named experience, no admission and no priced item. It is named in your written itinerary before you book, and not before.

Why the day is here Ten days with two intercity moves and a flight need one day that does not move at all, and this is it. The structure is not going to change when the ground handling lands; the contents will be filled in.

Flight

Shenzhen · Day 7 - Day 10

Day 7 · South to Shenzhen

A flight afternoon, and the day the route changes its subject. You go to sleep in a city that is forty years old.

The Hangzhou morning Not contracted, so not named and not priced, on the same terms as day six. Your onward flight is what is fixed about today.

Flight to Shenzhen One internal flight, economy class, in the base price; the flight number, time and cabin class for your order are written into your quote. The delta below you on the way down is a different one from the one you left: this water is the mouth of the Pearl River, and the ground beside it is worked at a different scale.

Airport pickup in Shenzhen Your Shenzhen driver and guide take over at the terminal, and the run into the city is on elevated road most of the way. Look right on the way in: the towers do not thin out toward the edge of town the way older cities do, because there is no older town underneath them.

Day 8 · Nobody in the driver's seat

One car with no driver in the morning, one market with everything in it after lunch. Today is the day the word "made" stops being an abstraction.

Robotaxi ride You hail it on a screen and it pulls up with the driver's seat empty. Inside, the sensors and cameras are reading the street and the wheel corrects itself through traffic, a few degrees at a time. It runs on a real operator's public route, which is why it is booked against your dates ahead of time.

Huaqiangbei Your guide walks the market with you and reads the building floor by floor: loose components at the bottom, prototype boards and modules above them, finished machines higher still. Stop at a counter on the components floor and look at the drawers behind the seller: that is the same catalog a factory buys from.

What the market is One of the world's best-known electronics markets, and still a working wholesale one rather than a display floor. Your guide explains who buys here and in what quantity, which is how the assembling gets explained without a factory visit.

Day 9 · The maker and the map

A company's own shop floor in the morning, a city's own account of itself after lunch. One of them is the product, the other is the plan that made room for it.

DJI flagship store A visit to the flagship store of the drone manufacturer headquartered here. Drones, cameras and imaging equipment are displayed on the shelves in the order the company developed them, and you can see how research, engineering and the consumer product coexist in the same building. Ask the staff what the newest model can do that last year's could not.

Shenzhen urban planning exhibition hall The reservation and admission are booked by us. Inside are the scale models, maps and phased plans the city keeps of how it was drawn and built, including the ground under the hall itself. Find the district you slept in on the big model and then find it out of the window: the model is not a proposal, it is a record.

The pairing The hall is the steady half of the Shenzhen days. Nothing about it depends on an operator or the weather, which is why it sits next to the ride that does.

Day 10 · Older than the city

The last morning is spent in the one part of Shenzhen that was here first. Then your driver takes you to the airport.

Shekou The district on the water at the south edge of the city, where the container terminals and the residential blocks share the same shoreline. From here Hong Kong is a shape across the water, roughly forty to sixty minutes away overland.

Nantou Old Town A walled settlement that stood here long before the city around it existed, and is still lived in: lanes, gates, houses built up against the old wall line. Stand in the main lane and look up past the roof tiles at the towers behind them. You'll feel the whole "built in forty years" story quietly correct itself.

Airport drop-off Your driver takes you to Shenzhen airport, timed to your flight with room to spare. Where your order leaves China through Hong Kong or Guangzhou instead, that crossing is arranged on request and quoted separately, and it is not part of your base price.

Departures

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Hotels

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Included / Excluded

What's Included

Private vehicleAir-conditioned private vehicle for all listed touring in Shanghai and in Shenzhen, including fuel, road tolls, parking and the driver's service allowance. Shanghai airport pickup on day one; Shanghai railway station drop-off on day four; Shenzhen airport pickup on day seven; Shenzhen airport drop-off on day ten
Intercity transportThree legs, all in the base price: Shanghai to Suzhou by high-speed train, second class, on day four · Suzhou to Hangzhou by high-speed train, second class, on day five · Hangzhou to Shenzhen by one-way domestic flight, economy class, on day seven. Standard checked baggage per the selected airline's policy. The cabin basis is the standing written standard across this supplier's current itineraries and is not yet signed back for this route, so every quote states the cabin class for that order in writing, and no order is taken without it
Hotels6 nights: Shanghai 3, on the nights of days one, two and three; Shenzhen 3, on the nights of days seven, eight and nine. Four-star, five-star or quality boutique at your chosen level, breakfast included, named in your written confirmation. The Suzhou night and the two Hangzhou nights are not in this line
GuideLicensed English-speaking guide on all listed touring days in Shanghai and Shenzhen, including the whole of the day-two Bund evening from start to finish
Tickets & experiences, ShanghaiYu Garden with the old city, admission included · Shanghai Museum, with timed reservation booked by us · Former French Concession with Wukang Road, walking, no admission · Huangpu River ferry, fare included · The Bund with the Pudong skyline in the evening, guide accompanied, no admission · Zhujiajiao on the morning of day four: rowing boat ride, Kezhi Garden admission, and Fangsheng Bridge walk
Tickets & experiences, ShenzhenOne robotaxi ride on day eight, fare · Huaqiangbei electronics market, guided walk, no admission · DJI flagship store, in-store visit, no admission · Shenzhen urban planning exhibition hall, admission and reservation booked by us · Shekou with Nantou Old Town, walking, no admission
Robotaxi availabilityThe ride is included in the base price, and the operator, not us, decides whether the service runs on the day. Each order is rechecked before departure and the result is provided to you in writing. Where the recheck shows that the service will not run, the ride is removed from the plan and its amount is deducted from that order; no substitute and no rebooking are promised in advance.
Meals6 hotel breakfasts: Shanghai on the mornings of days two, three and four; Shenzhen on the mornings of days eight, nine and ten
Other servicesBottled drinking water on listed touring days. Travel accident insurance for the duration of the journey

Not Included

International flightsFlights into Shanghai and out of Shenzhen
Suzhou and Hangzhou ground servicesGround handling, guiding, vehicles and admissions on days four to seven, and the three Jiangnan hotel nights
Departure connection from ShenzhenWhere your order departs China via Hong Kong or Guangzhou rather than Shenzhen, the cross-border transport, border formalities and onward ticket are at your own expense
VisasVisa fees and processing for guests who require a Chinese visa
MealsBeyond the 6 breakfasts listed above: all lunches and dinners are recommended and booked by your guide, on your account
Cabin upgradesRail first class or business class and premium cabin air, priced separately when you choose them
Optional add-onsPriced separately when you choose them; nothing optional is added into the base plan. The Shanghai Tower observation deck is the one optional item on this route at present
PersonalGratuities, single or extra-room difference, personal spending

Special Notes

A few things on this route follow a contract, a calendar or an operator's confirmation. Here they are, told straight.

Bookings are not open yet — Suzhou and Hangzhou must each have contracted, bookable ground handling in place first, meaning vehicle, guide, admissions and hotel, and both cities must then be named in the inclusions above. Until that is done we take no orders and no deposits. Tell us your dates and we will write to you on the day it opens.
Days four to seven — the two rail legs through those cities are included in your price, because rail ticketing is contracted separately from ground handling. The ground itself is not. Nothing in Suzhou or Hangzhou is named as an experience, sold as a highlight, or priced into a quote on this page.
The robotaxi ride — in your price, and not a promise about the day. The operator decides whether the service runs. Your order is rechecked before departure and you get the result in writing; if it will not run, the ride comes out of the plan and its amount comes off your order. We do not promise a substitute or a rebooking in advance.
Cabin class — Second-class rail and economy air is the standing written standard across this supplier's current itineraries and is not yet signed back for this route. Until it is, every quote states in writing the cabin class for that order, and no order is taken without it. Upgrades are priced separately when you choose them.
This route is not sold to the United States market — Shenzhen currently has no direct air service to the United States, so the departure gateway of this plan does not apply to US guests. A version with a different departure gateway would be a different product and would require compliance review again; nothing is guaranteed here.
Leaving from Shenzhen — Shenzhen has full direct service to France, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium, and to Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece. Direct points are limited for the UK, the Nordic countries with Central Europe and Ireland, Canada, and Australia with New Zealand, so each order is checked against the timetable for that departure date. Where no suitable direct service exists, the order leaves China through Hong Kong or Guangzhou instead; the overland crossing to Hong Kong runs about 40 to 60 minutes. That connection is not in your base price. We book it on request and quote it separately.
Visa window — the 30-day visa-free policy currently runs through December 31, 2026. Because this is a 10-day plan, departures on or before December 22, 2026 finish inside that window; later departure dates are quoted only after the official renewal is announced.
The national holiday week — There is no blackout month and no blocked date on file for this route, but the scheduling rule for the October 1 to 7 holiday week is being settled together with the Jiangnan ground handling. We take no orders for that week before it is settled.
Shanghai Museum reservation — Entry is by timed slot and the booking system carries limited English, so we book your slot with the details on your confirmation.
On the Bund after dark — People do approach visitors on the waterfront with invitations to practise English or to go for tea, and those invitations end at a bill. Your guide is with you for the whole evening, which is the simplest answer to it.
Confirmation and changes — The confirmation-time commitment and the change and refund terms are being finalised with our ground partners. Until they are settled, each quote states in writing its own confirmation deadline and its change and refund conditions, and no order is taken without them. This route holds two rail legs and one domestic flight, so a date change touches rail, air and hotel inventory at once.

Is Ten Days Your Length?

Fewer than ten days?

The two ends come apart cleanly. Shanghai with Zhujiajiao stands on its own, and so does the Shenzhen half; the delta in the middle is the part that shortens. Tell us your dates and who is coming, and we cut days rather than cut the pace.

Good to Know

Group: Private, just your party. From 1 guest. No fixed maximum party size.
Pace: Four cities in 10 days: Shanghai 3 nights, Suzhou 1, Hangzhou 2, Shenzhen 3. Two rail legs and one flight, with one day in Hangzhou that does not move at all
Effort: Level ground throughout, no altitude and no climbs. The walking days are the market floors, the old lanes and the canal town
Ports: Shanghai in, Shenzhen out; airport pickup on day one and drop-off on day ten. Where no suitable direct service exists out of Shenzhen, the order leaves through Hong Kong or Guangzhou, arranged on request and quoted separately
Visas: Most European and UK passports enter visa free for days, as do Canadian, Australian and New Zealand ones, checked order by order against your dates. This route is not sold to the United States market
Language: Licensed English-speaking local guides on all listed touring days in Shanghai and Shenzhen
Payment: When this route opens for booking: From 1 guest. A 10% deposit (minimum $399) locks your dates. The balance is due 14 days before departure. "Or similar" never means a quiet downgrade
Season: Selling window October to December 2026. No order is taken for the October 1 to 7 holiday week until its scheduling rule is settled; departures on or before December 22, 2026 finish inside the current visa-free window

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Made Here

Overview

Why you'll love this trip