EDIT March 2015: please refer to the latest blog post about agencies helping overlanders cross through China unguided, after reading this!
After our unforgettable and blissfully unguided self-drive traverse of China (and countless requests for more details from fellow travellers) it is now time to finally introduce you to the man who made it all possible. A man willing to go to much effort in order to help fellow adventurers. 😀
Meet Ricard Tomas Herrero. A Spanish businessman who has been living and working in and out of China for over 20 years.
China Tierra de Aventura is his baby, sort to speak, his pet project. It is not hugely known nor is it widely publicized, which is why it took me over a year to discover it even existed. It seemed that this tour company was very much an insider’s secret…one we were elated to uncover!
While Ricard has been running phenomenal motorbike trips from Madrid to Beijing every year for over a decade, this is the first time he has organised a fully independent crossing of China for overland bikers. And he’s willing to do more!
Ricard has a fantastic team of fixers spread out all over China, people ready to help and support you through the logistical issues you are bound to come across as you ride through the country. They are all just a phone call away but otherwise, you are free to ride as you wish, within certain boundaries of course. Tibet, for example, still requires a guide to be with you 24 hours a day.
Want to be among the first to ride through China on your own? Here’s your chance!
It’s important to note, however, that it still ain’t gonna be a walk in the park. It will take lots of preparation time, a substantial amount of money (still only a mere fraction of a guided tour) and much resourcefulness on the part of whoever tackles it. Support may be there, but never right next to you to translate, negotiate, argue and organize. You must still be able to tackle all that on your own. We were joined by Michael Stumman Nielsen (a motorbiking friend of ours from Denmark) and three proved to be an ideal number. As with all overlanding travel destinations, China can be quite intense, so it’s ideal to have two co-travellers to share the load and stress!
Not for the novice overlander I’d say, but if you have a few experiences up your sleeve, and don’t mind a wee challenge, then a fully independent China crossing promises to deliver a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
What’s included?
Ricard will organize all the documentation you will need. This will take a minimum of 3 months to organize. Your entry must still be guided by a local agent, who will escort you up to the first major city, where you will get a Chinese driver’s licence and vehicle number plate. You will be sent on your merry lonesome way, soon thereafter. You can have your hand held, figuratively speaking, as much or as little as you wish, depending on how confident you feel. As an example: we had ‘fixers’ escort us through the first two major cities and after that, once we realized that with a GPS and some pre-planning we could go it alone, and requested no more escorts. It worked a treat.
We may have been the very first foreign overlanders to have crossed through China legally, and independently, with our own foreign-registered vehicle. We appreciate how special this experience is and how it has the potential of revolutionizing the well-trodden overlanding route from Europe to South East Asia. No more shipments from India or Russia and no more cargo flights from Kathmandu to Bangkok. Not only is this option now a reality, but it is within the reach or even the most budget-conscious traveller.
As a token of our appreciation towards Ricard and his team, all we want to do now, is to pay it forward to fellow travellers.
Should you have any questions, before contacting Ricard for a quote, do not hesitate to contact me either though this site’s contact page or my Globetrotter Guidebook’s FB page. If you prefer to write in German, please contact Chris on Hinter Dem Horizont Links.
We will be more than happy to guide you through the preparations, just as Ricard was happy to guide us through the entire process.
Happy travels through China!
Yours
Laura & Chris x
PS. Welcome newcomers! 😀 For all who are new to my site, here is a link to my first China-crossing blog, where I detail HOW we managed to convince Ricard that a self-drive, guide-less tour would be perfectly legal. Click here for more!
PSS. Edited 10th November 2014. Please do note that I share Ricard’s email address on the last China blog. PLEASE READ the next post and the one after so you are well aware of ALL that concerns crossing China without a guide. Cheers!
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Awsome! I’am looking forward to your feature blogs! We love to make an unguided overland tour (with our small camper)……
Yours Gert
hey Gert…super!
Check out the last two blogs (the two following this one), they are now online!
Safe and happy travels 😀
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thnxxxxx……have been sitting on a RTW for a year wondering how to tackle China-costs! Have just done an all india 13000km bike trip and shall now ge back to tackle a RTW. shall look forward to ur updates.
cheers!
aditya
Hi Laura and Chris. Congratulations! That’s great news. I rode from Islamabad to Kashgar in 2012. The cost and time involved was horrendous. And when I tried to leave for Sary Tash in Kyrgyzstan it took 3-4 hours at the border because of missing paperwork – even though the guide was looking after everything! But I still have my Chinese numberplate and drivers license as a souvenir! Best of luck with the rest of your trip. Cheers, Brian.
Hey Brian, thanks for your message. Yep, the number plate & driver’s licence are also my most precious souvenir from 2014! eheh Hopefully it will now become much more mainstream to travel unguided through this humongous country. Fingers crossed! Cheers 🙂
Wow! This is very promising… We are waiting this to happen for years! That will make the whole overlanding route from the West to the East much more interesting!
Thanks for sharing!
Hey Elias, from what we experienced, we think China is incredibly interesting no matter which direction you travel! Cheers 😀
Hmmmm found this page too late….booked my trip(with 3 other riders) with Navo tours to go Laos-Mongolia in april.All has been paid already and done and dusted.Pity….however if we like it the way I’m expecting to do I’ll be back for more in 2017.
Michiel fromBelgium
Hi Michiel, I’m sure you will have an amazing time nonetheless and yes, at least you can consider it on your way back. Have fun, China is an incredibly fascinating country to travel through 🙂
Amazing!! Congrats!!
I have been looking for information of how to get and ride through China with my motorbike since one year ago and this is what I was searching!!!
You guys have opened a big door for all travellers!
thanks Carlos!!!
Please check out the latest blog post….we’ve just found another AND cheaper option!! wooo hoooooo!
http://laurastraveltales.com/travel-independently-through-china-take-2/
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Hallo Laura, do you have a contact that can bring me and my car from Kasachtan to Mongolia, dont want to crash my Russian visa for the crossing.
I need a driver that will meet me at entrance boarder point arrange costums and drive my car to the other side (3 days) and arrange costums again. I have my visa already
Greetings Michael
Hi Michael, I have no idea who could do that for you, to be honest. Our own trip is now almost 3 years old and we’re out of the loop. Anyway, why not reach out to Hendrik from TibetMoto and see if he can help you in any way?? It’s worth a shot. Good luck!
Hei Laura. So nice and good to read this, I am already researching sinc a long time now how to overcome this big charges of China and this is the first positive post. I tried to click on your links to find out the email of Ricard Tomas Herrero but unfortunatly it doesnt work. Could you please give me his email?
Thank you very much
Isabel
Hi Isabel. I’ve just found your comment in my spam folder so apologies for the delay in replying to you. How is your research going? I assume you eventually read the following two blog posts about our China crossing and know, by now, that Ricard is no longer taking independent travellers through Chinam nor is anyone else that I know of. Unfortunately, I’ve been out of the ‘overlanding through China’ loop for far too long and have no updated info that could be helpful. Best I can do is suggest you post questions on Overland to Asia and Overland Sphere (on Facebook) to see what travellers have been able to do in the last year. Good luck and happy trails to you :)))