So where do you expect one to find information such as about possibilities to stay in chinese hotels other than from friends who have been riding through China, from tripreports here on the forum etc? Is that information worthless? My friend Mika who is a member here have been riding through China , and he was the first, or at least one of the first guy riding through China without guides etc. He have also posted his stories and ride reports here and I have also heard them directly from him. He had problems finding accomodation. Cheap accomodation was in general non accsessible for foreigners and he was even thrown out of places were he at first was allowed to stay after the police made a visit to the hotel/gh. The same is reported from the guy who just recently posted his adventures in China here. I cannot finds his postings here for the moment and doesnt remember his name/nick but he had a paralyzed arm and he was buying a bike in China and riding it around there for a good bit of time. He had also problems finding accomodation and he was slso thrown out of places he had been allowed to check into - if I remember his stories right.

But of course we shouldnt belive in such statementd as they come from the internet and from friends and thus of course are all lies.

Well I can of course - tell my own experiences from riding through China if that would matter. But then again it will just be another story on the internet wouldnt it? And thus not reliable. Well I rode through China in 2014, 30 days and around 6000 kms, entering from Kyrgizstan and exiting to Laos. It was an organised group. And the whole itinerary and accomodation was booked long time in advance. But then again 2-3 times it happend that we had to deviate from our original route and had to improvise and find accomodation "out of the book". And for those poor guides of our who had to do it they had a really hard time to find a place that could actually house us. Local police, regional police, higher authorities had to be called and had to approve that foreigners could stay in a hotel without license to do so. I remember especially one remote little town somewhere in Yunnan where there were only one little guesthouse and because of a landslide we couldnt get further so we had to spend a night there. And this little guesthouse had of course not permition to house foreigners and thus it took our guides several hours to get recognition and approval so that we could stay there. So accomodation isnt easy for foreigners in China - thats sure!
Well - dont belive me as this is just another internetstory.....

Thaiplated bikes or other foreign bikes into Vietnam - as I mentioned in my other post - yes some come through without any permits or in organised tours, with expensive organised tours you will come in and with a hefty permit one seem to come in nowadays. But just rocking up at the border will hardly be very succesful. There are dozens of reports of peoplewho have been denied at the vietnamese border. But then again - some people dont belive in tripreports on the internet. I find a bit strange that someone that mistrusts stories written on the internet such as here on the Horizons even bother to write here themselves, as netstories isnt reliable at all. But youre definetively right - one shouldnt belive all one reads on the internet.

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In the end everything will be fine. If its not fine its not the end....