Chengdu and Chongqing

[pong]

Sorry, cannot help in this respect. But why the heck stay that long in those 2 big cities only? Was it so inviting/exciting to plan to come back already?
Have been 5x to mainland CHina (and 2x Taiwan-last one late nov.), first 2 in a group, long pre 2000, then by myself, but every time it got more nasty+difficult to get visa etc. Travel around all by yourself, AND on a budget also more a challenge as what one thinks of as be a holiday. Did not chase after gay adventures.
Hint: go via Laos and by train-the better parts of China (in general view) are those with the lesser nr of Chinese, so then you come in Yunnan/Kunming. You pass sipsongpanna, where they speak a kind of Thai. But perhaps this new visa-free is only valid when enter via some airports-maybe not even coming overland from HongKong.