Finding the right station. In Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Guilin and Wuhan, there are at least two train stations in these cities. Please kindly find out in which train station you are supposed to board your train in advance.

Passing security control. When you arrive at the station you must first go through security control to departure area. But please notice these objects that are forbidden in the train, as following: animals, the toxic, flammable and explosive goods.

Locating the right waiting lounge. Usually there are several waiting lounges in the station you should find the right one to board the train. And the electronic message board will remind passengers which is the right one for each train. You should pay attention to it. The tickets will be checked when entering the lounges. You should take care of your tickets.

On board
Ticket ' card. At soft or hard sleeper class carriages, you are required to change your ticket to a plastic card after boarding the train. Before you arrive at your destination it will be changed back. You should keep your ticket because you are required to show the ticket before leaving the exit.

Dining on board. We usually arrange overnight trains for the convenience of our clients. Dinner and breakfast will be done before or after train travel. Once the clients need to have snacks or meals on board, they can go to the dining car of Car 8, except express trains Beijing/shanghai, Beijing/HK and Beijing/Xian, most of trains don't have English menu and many selections of food.

Train staff. The staff working on trains has little knowledge of English. If possible, please prepare a phrase book for the emergency. In fact, more and more Chinese people, especially younger generations can speak English.

Bathroom in the train. The big issue while traveling by train in China is the bathroom on board. At each end of carriages, there is one toilet (one is western style in soft sleeper carriages). Please bring your own toilet paper before you use it since it is not available inside. When the train is approaching one stop the bathroom is always locked. When it runs again the bathroom will be unlocked.

More attention to the belongings. Please take care about your belongings, wherever you are in soft sleep, hard sleep, soft seat or hard seat in the train. Especially, keep the important things with you all the time, such as, passport, visa, wallet and other things like that. If taking hard seat class of some slow trains please be cautious at night, in some parts, there are pickpockets.

Taking care of the kids. When traveling with children you are suggested to pay more attention to them. It is better for children to sleep on the lower berth or with parents in case they fall off the berth. Sometimes the guardrails can't work completely for little children.

Please don't accept the beverage or food from the strangers because someone may have bad intentions.

For more information, please also visit the webpage at http://www.chinatraintrip.com/train-tips/index.html

Ricky Yang - A China travel specialist who has been in tourism industry for 15 years