Hi i had an offer
of 13000 and one of 16000 USD to enter from Nepal where we have our projects by bike
I refused the offer, in knowing that a staff of our projects works 8 years for this money and in order to support no corruption, i no its idealistic now we are in japan, but sometimes...not the own effort counts
Still i have the mailadresses of the 2 agents in Nepal
the package included four weeks with jeep support (whom we dont wanted too) hotels Route china and tibet (2 weeks each to the mongolian border)
best wishes and greetings
Rocco
Manu & Rocco on Tour
Govinda Entwicklungshilfe e.V. - Hilfe für Waisenkinder und Schulen in Nepal

If people don't mind riding light, I would suggest flying into China, buying a bike and riding. The western provinces of China are not only less populated (which makes them safer) but also astoundingly beautiful and dramatic thanks to the Tibetan Plateau and Takl. Desert.

Getting your own bike in must be possible but can be a hassle just to get in the door. I'm sure you can get a "valid Chinese license" but the amount of money you pay for it and the other documents is a bit outrageous and having an escort on your ass all the time is a pain almost worth considering buy, riding, and selling. But hey, if you've got the dosh, might as well spend it!

Also, I have heard talk of a system to issue temporary licenses to foreigners visiting China. Each province, however, has slightly different rules, regulations, processes and fee's. Sichuan is pretty easy but I could imagine the East coast cities could be more particular.

For more general info and maps and geotagged photos and stuff...check out CarlParker.com - Western China Motorcycle Travel and Photography

Smiley,

I'm also in Cheng-Du. Haven't seen a 4ner buzzing around on a CBR yet. If you see black plates with 76 that'd be me. Stop me and say hey.

I've been doing inter-province travel in China for the past 3 years. Right now, it's not a problem. There are thousands of other Chinese motorcycle tourists who also travel inter-province practically year round.

What's more of a problem is the CBR on certain kinds of roads. I saw a guy on a kawi400 couldn't even make it half way up Balangshan pass (just west of Chengdu). His buddies were waiting for him but the guy was scared sh*tless. Smooth street tires really don't do well in high wind on packed ice/snow. If you choose your route carefully you can have a good time but there are no continuously paved roads heading west from Chengdu and since they won't let you on most new expressways, get ready for some monkey butt moments!

CrazyCarl

__________________
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The world's newest, most super-awesome Chinese Motorcycle and Travel Community!
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Personal China travel info, photo and video site:
http://www.carlparker.com

You can organize a local Chinese drivers license - temporary permission to ride foreign motorcycles in Yinning. Motoexplorers organize this on the China Moto expeditions. You also need to have a raft of paperwork including clearance from ministry level in Beijing, entry permits for each Province, permission from Police & tourism authorities, army clearance, customs agents for entry & exit formalities (at each border crossing) as well as all hotel bookings, plus the Chinese driving license. If you wanted to get all formalities pre-cleared for you to ride across China, Motoexplorers would usually recommend starting to do this process about 5-6 months before arrival date - you could join in with a small group of riders also doing all of these formalities - saves money having to pay for all the guides, permits, vehicle etc alone, get Motoexplorers to do all the paperwork and organising; http://www.motoexplorers.co.uk then you can ride on your own, at your own pace each day across china. Usually permissions are granted for 30 days to explore China. You have to nominate an exit port, somewhere like a sea-freight port near Beijing, or better still exit by land crossing the border to Laos - nicer routes and easier formalities for border paperwork. Then a nice ride through Laos to Thailand and from Bangkok you can ride freely or freight your bike anywhere in the World.

.

.
Do you work for motoexplorers?

Very much sounds like it.


vette

Recently in the last few months, I was planning to get my motorbike license in China. I have been living here for the past three years and I am also married to a local lady. This process started out very uninformatively, making several trips to my local DMV for paper after paper, and the local DMV not fully explaining ALL the infomation needed. After I would say about three months I gathered all the necessary paperwork for my local DMV to get me into the test room.

Papers included are: visa with more than 3 months valid price of visa's ranges in China, copy of passport/visa that was copied at the DMV no cost, photos also done at the DMV 10 yuan, medical check 8 yuan also done at the DMV, a fully translated copy of my passport main page that has my photo "offically stamped" 60 yuan, a copy of my residence permit free from you locally resigtered police station and finally the paper work from the DMV to approve you for your aplication to take the test 130 yuan.

Getting all this completed and taking time away from my daily life was a wait off my shoulders. BUT once I got into the DMV and was called up to the computer testing room I was asked IF i was taking the test in Chinese OR did I want it in English. Of course my Chinese is not that technical enough to read and respond to a full Chinese test and I was glad I had a very good friend with me to explain that I needed the test in English. After about 45 minutes of waiting I got an erie gut feeling that something was very wrong and I was going to be unable to take such test. Sure enough the testing "officer" told my friend there is NO English test in all of China (this made me laugh because I had my laptop and phone on me with the trasnlated test on PDF format from 2012). So I decided to show the test to the "officers" with my friend and just ask, why? This got me no further then hitting myself in the head with a hammer. Frustrated as ever, and I'm sure you can understand I headed right back to the DMV and just about hit the roof. Did i mention on the first three times in those last few months I asked if they had the English version of the test, AND I was assured the test was there. My friend and myself made a huge ruckus in the DMV on testing day so pretty much hundreds of people saw. The managing "officer" of the DMV made a few phone calls and then said "I'm sorry but there is not test in China". Yet again I presented him with the test I had on my phone and he told me I need to take the test in Chinese if I want the license. He told me line after line about blah blah blah I didn't really care because I knew he was full of it.

So I have been surfing around as many website deaing with the English test or pretty much anything to do with China and motorcycles, and all I want to know is when will this test be available? I have come to find out it's already in place in Shanghai, BUT no-were else? I find this extremely pathetic and unorganized because all I want to do is buy a motorbike and drive it LEGALLY! and trust me its not that hard to just buy one and drive 80% of the motorbikes in my city are unplated, and thats including all the foreigners I know.

So please if anyone can shed some light on this subject it would be greatly appreciated!

This thread is a little old,

but I did all the same as you mentioned.

I did my test in English.

3 Dec. 2012

Full car, and big bikes

Class C1D

vette

Hi rsbeemer,
We have talk about the China motor travel each other, I have do the job 5 years, I do not know why all man think it is diffcult to travel in China, If you want ride your own bike, It is OK, just ship it to China, I could help you get what you want get, you could buy a bike in China too, Harly, Honda, BMW... I could help you to get the licence. Yes, You need pay for some money, but It is not so expensive, I have do the motor travel with Edwiss, Lotus, and some USA Europe peoples, All is OK.
Do you trust it?
Adam Yu
http://www.chinamotortravel.com

Hi,
true, there are bikes (HD/Yamaha/BMW) for sale in Mainland China on the black markets and stolen from Australia / Japan / USA with "fake" registration.
hope nobody encourages this kind deals offered since myself hopes everyday that my motorbike is still there..., in the morning when i wake up...
there was a "tour operator" in the Northern Region of PRC who successfully scammed ($$$$) several groups of bike riders from Australia / Europe and they had articles in various bike magazines and www discussion groups.
best regards, H.Zucker

HI,
@Adam (China Motorcycle Travel)

which kind of China tours did you arrange for Edelweiss Travel, references / contact person available? do you have any other references with overseas tour operators?

don't get me wrong, are you somehow interlinked or associated with the "self claimed" Harley Adventure Tours China and were advertising under -stagnet- free webserver approx. 2 years ago?

myself and some friends tried approx. 2 years ago to arrange a tour through China and had contact with a person asking for huge amounts of money up front and asked us to ship our bikes two month in advance (yeah, right!) and they would not guarantee custom clearance? right, 12 bikes confiscated and afterwards sold somewhere in the Mainland.

The truth is out there- trust nobody!
Best Regards,
H.Zucker

Last night I met a fellow in Beijing who is riding in a group from Shanghai to Munchen. They are 13 people who transported their bikes to Shanghai and registered the bikes and got local driver's licence. So it is possible to ride your own bike in China. Admittedly they have a car in front and back and are not allowed to drive on their own. You can check more from www.globeriders.com

Thhis has been possible for a long time, but as noted you must have a guide all the way and it is expensive. It also takes a lot of work and red tape cutting to put it all together.

"on your own with a bike" is still impossible. sigh. maybe someday.

------------------
Grant Johnson

Seek, and ye shall find.
------------------------

One world, Two wheels.
www.HorizonsUnlimited.com

__________________
Grant Johnson
Seek, and ye shall find.
------------------------
Inspiring, Informing and Connecting travellers since 1997!
www.HorizonsUnlimited.com

A note on entering China, motoring in China and exiting China: It appears that a new rule change has just gone into effect this month (May 2002). I was working on making arrangements for a couple to enter Xinjiang via Torugart Pass, motor about 30 days through China (Xinjiang-Gansu-Sichuan-Yunnan) and with them exiting to Vietnam. Just last week I received notice that Public Security in Beijing denied their itinerary (which included the required accompanying liaison officer with his own vehicle and driver). I was told that the there has been a rule change and that "inter-province" travel with foreign-licensed motorcycles is now prohibited. Strange thing, as this was fine up through last year. Now, I have been told that it is okay to enter China and travel in the province (Xinjiang as an example), but that the motorcylist is required to exit China from the same province.

The above prohibition does not apply to motorcycles registered in China. I know this because an Italian (whose motoring account is elsewhere on this board) just arrived in Kashgar a few days ago after an eventful trip motoring across China from Shanghai.

Does this mean it is going to be easier to enter China via the KKH & leave again the same way or is there just as much bureaucracy
to deal with & still the requirement to pay lotsa money & have an escourt?

__________________
Rich
www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/richardandlisa
www.youtube.com/richparkie

G'Day,
"inter-province" travel with PRC registered motorcycles was banned more than 2 years ago but as foreigner you can get away with it under certain circumstances and even the italian yor referring to (actually it's Stefano who is a member of RDMC Shanghai as well) had his share of problems and encounters with police and other authorities to cross China on a Zhejiang registration.

once again, in may 2001 we drove 6000k's through china (Shanghai > Nanjing > Qingdao > Jinan > Tinajin > Beijing > Nanjing > Shanghai) and were stopped several times by police / PSB (public security bureau) but myself had the bright idea to attach small Beijing 2008 Olympic flags to the bikes and after telling the authorities we are the "official" olympic bid support team, we got waved on and had to give several interviews to media (newspaper/TV stations) along the way.

yes, you can arrange travelling by "foreign" registerd motorcycle in PRC but your under official security / guard of guides / police all the time and your not allowed to travel freely or as individual. Harley Owners Group Hong-Kong is arranging another Hong-Kong > Shanghai > Nanjing trip (13 days) in oct.02 and that whole thing is $$$$ due to police escorts, travel permits, temporary drivers license, etc.

__________________
Somewhere down the road in China since '89 ~ along the route I've learned the hard way that pleasing everyone is impossible, but pissing everybody off is a piece of cake....TBR

A couple of Malaysian outfits, namely Petronas Adventure Team and Douglas Chong of Ipoh, organize 4WD trips into China and other farflung places every now and then in the last couple of years or so.

Often, there are bikers in their trips.

In fact PAT is somewhere in China right now heading towards Siberia in their latest run.

You can check out the details at www.petronasadventure.com.

I'm curious myself as to whether they are allowed into China on the same terms as for others, i.e. bureacratic and expensive, or on easier terms.

Come to think of it why don't I do it myself!