Shanghai + China in 6 Days on a Budget

Six Days: Add Beijing Properly Instead of Rushing It

Six days is the shortest trip length where a Beijing add-on stops being a compromise, because you can finally give the Forbidden City and the Great Wall separate days instead of squeezing both into one exhausting round trip.

Book these before you go:

Day 1: arrival, one evening in the city. Get the visa scheme sorted before you land (240-hour transit versus the 30-day waiver are different rules), plus payments and a VPN, all covered in the Shanghai China guide . Spend the evening on the Bund, free, then get an early night.

Day 2: Suzhou. Fastest G-trains from Hongqiao run 25-30 minutes, Y21-40 second class, close to the Humble Administrator’s Garden and the Lingering Garden for a full day without a taxi.

Day 3: Hangzhou and West Lake. About 45 minutes by G-train to Hangzhou East, roughly Y73 second class, then Metro Line 1 direct to West Lake in another 30.

Day 4: Zhujiajiao water town. About 70 minutes door to door via Metro Lines 2 and 10, then 17, roughly Y8 total; a combined ticket around Y80 covers the main gardens, gondola rides run Y80-150 per boat. Go on a weekday.

See the 4-day itinerary for the same four days at full length; nothing changes about them here.

Day 5: HSR to Beijing, the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. Take an early G-train from Hongqiao or Shanghai Railway Station, roughly 4.5-6 hours depending on the service, around Y550-660 second class; flying is about 2.5 hours in the air but rarely faster once you count airport transfers on both ends, and usually costs more unless booked well ahead. You’ll land early-to-mid afternoon, enough time for Tiananmen Square and a few hours in the Forbidden City before it closes; save the full palace complex for tomorrow morning if you want more than a walkthrough. Stay overnight near either sight, check Beijing hotel rates on Agoda , both areas sit centrally enough that you won’t need a taxi to get back out the next morning.

Day 6: the Great Wall, then the train home. Mutianyu is the easier half-day option from central Beijing than Badaling, less crowded and with a cable car if you don’t want the full climb; go early to beat both the crowds and the midday heat in summer. Head back to the station by mid-afternoon for an evening train to Shanghai, or fly back if you’d rather trade cost for an extra hour or two in Beijing that morning.

If Beijing isn’t the pull for you, the same six days work just as well swapped for Xi’an (the terracotta army, roughly 6-7 hours by the fastest rail routing or 2.5 hours flying), or for Guilin/Yangshuo or Chengdu, both of which run 10-plus hours by train versus roughly 3 hours flying, at which point flying stops being optional and just becomes the sensible choice. Whichever you pick, book that leg as its own reservation, not an add-on to your Shanghai hotel booking; cancellation terms on Chinese domestic rail and flights are stricter than most first-time visitors expect. Shanghai’s official tourism portal is worth a check before you lock any of this in.