For my work for Purism I just had to book, even pretty short term, a trip from California USA to Shenzhen China. Since I needed to go in less than a week I already expected a pretty expensive ticket. But I was proven wrong, I got a roundtrip flight from Los Angeles (LAX) for US$500! With Hainan airlines, which I have not heard of before. This was very very amazing! I would totally recommend Hainan again, pretty new planes, comfortable, good service

The flight from LAX to China is awfully long. Including a layover about 20 hours travel time, ouch. This specific trip went from Los Angeles (LAX) to Chengdu with 14 hours and 45 minutes and then from Chegdu to Shenzhen, another 2 hours and 25 minutes. In Chengdu, a city you probably have not yet heard of (at least I had not) there was a lay over of about 2.5 hours, every minute of it was needed! First for immigration into China then for re-check-in to the connecting flight, again through security and then finally walking! And walking… and walking. This airport was HUGE! And for a weekday morning amazingly empty. We reached the other gate just in time for boarding the ext plane.

Shenzhen is a modern city with a decent metro system which connects directly to the airport. Our meeting next day was near Dongguan so we stayed near the airport in the part of Shenzhen which is called Bao An. After that we went with the fast train from Shenzhen North train station to Xiamen, about 4 hours train ride. I booked the train ticket in advance, the fast trains can be pretty packed so it is advisable to get the tickets in advance. Pre booked tickets can be picked up at the ticket counters, you will need your passport. A day after returning from Xiamen we had the flight back to LAX, this time via Chongqing, another of the multi-million people cities of China, no one has ever heard of before.

So all in all, a pretty good trip, everything went smooth.