3 Days Classic Harbin Winter Tour

Day 1 Harbin Arrival

Harbin airport/train station pick up & hotel check-in

Ni Hao! Welcome to Harbin, the Capital of Heilongjiang Province, which is well known as the "Ice City" in China. Your local guide will meet you at the arrival hall of the airport / railway station. Then you will be escorted to your hotel (prebooked by us) in downtown Harbin. The rest of today is on your own to explore this city.

Arrival Ideas:

Harbin Taiping International Airport is 41 km’s driving distance from downtown area. It has flights from Beijing (2 hrs), Dalian (1.5 hrs), Qingdao (2 hrs), Jinan (2 hrs), Xian (3 hrs), Shanghai (3 hrs), Chengdu (3.5-4 hrs), Ordos (2.5 hrs), Hangzhou (3 hrs), Guangzhou (4-4.5 hrs), Xiamen (4-4.5hrs), Wuhan (3-3.5 hrs), Sanya (5 hrs) and more destinations in China, and more international cities like Seoul, Tokyo, Osaka, Moscow, Phuket Island, etc. While Harbin West Railway Station has high-speed trains linking Harbin with Beijing (7~8 hrs), Changchun (1 hr), Shenyang (2.5~3 hrs), Dalian (4~5 hrs), Jilin (2-3 hrs), Tianjin (6.5 hrs), etc.

Evening Ideas (Explore on your own):

In this evening, you can visit Zhaolin Park, one of the 3 main venues of Harbin Ice and Snow Festival, to appreciate the wonderful world largest scale of outdoor ice lantern show. Take a relaxing walk in the “ocean of ice lantern” with over thousand exquisite arts that are totally different every year and feel the joy of the big World Ice and Snow Festival. (Please note: it holds every year from January 5th to the end of February. Please wear warm down coat and shoes when visiting it at night.)

• Ice City - Harbin
• Harbin Ice Lantern Fair at Zhaolin Park

Day 2 Harbin (B, L)

St. Sophia Cathedral - Zhongyang Pedestrian Street - Sun Island - Siberian Tiger Park - Ice and Snow World

Today, after breakfast, your guide and driver will meet you at your hotel. You’ll first visit Sophia Square to admire the holy appearance of the St. Sophia Cathedral from 1907. This must-visit site is a typical Byzantine architecture with a large green dome and was once the largest Orthodox Church in the Far East. The cathedral is the symbolic architecture in Harbin and at present is used as Harbin Architectural Art Gallery and displays some souvenirs. Then, you’ll visit the nearby exotic Zhongyang Pedestrian Street from 1900. Stroll along this 1,400 meters long historic street to appreciate the 71 precious buildings in different styles with long history, including Renaissance, Baroque, etc. (The Stalin Park is very close to the pedestrian, so if you are interested and time permits, you could walk there to admire the Russian architectures and enjoy many creative artistic sculptures.)

After that, continue your fabulous enjoyment to the Sun Island Scenic Resort, which is a major venue to hold the International Snow Sculpture Art Expo on Harbin Ice and Snow Festival in winter. Walk into this vast pure lovely fairyland of 60,000 square meters and meet the incredible “white visual storm”. Have a close look at the thousands of excellent large-scaled artistic snow sculptures of landscape, cartoon, figures, buildings, etc., which will make you wow at the outstanding talent of the craftsmen who inject life into the cold snow. With so amazing backdrop, you just can’t help taking some great photos to record the nice moment (You are highly advised to wear sunglasses to visit the Snow Sculpture Art Fair since the glary from sunshine on the snow is really intense.)

Then, be escorted to the nearby Siberian Tiger Park, the largest breeding center in the world for endangered Siberian Tigers that. Over 1,300 purebred Siberian Tigers are raised there. You’ll not only pay a safe walk to observe different kinds of tigers (Siberian Tigers, White Tigers, White Lion, Leopard, Liger, etc.), but also take a tourist bus with wire-mesh protection through the park to closely see the tigers and lions and take some photos.

After dinner, you will head to the incredible gorgeous Ice and Snow World, the highlights of annual Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival. Start your freedom stroll in the dazzling magical world of ice where to appreciate over 2,000 pieces of sculptures of ice and snow including pagodas, towers, famous world architectures, landscapes, and so forth dyed with romantic colorful LED lights, which can easily make you want to stay longer in such an “Ice Wonderland in Harbin”. Besides the sightseeing, if you would like to enjoy the festive atmosphere to the fullest, you can choose to have fun with the world longest sliding, or other winter activities on ice, such as ice maze, ice climbing, skating, etc.

Note: 1) Please wear enough layers of proper clothes and warm shoes to keep you away from the freeze especially when you want to stay here longer to enjoy the beautiful scenery. 2) An indoor Ice and Snow Paradise with smaller scale is built in the scenic area of the Ice and Snow World, and tourists could also enjoy the ice and snow there as well when the festival ends. 3) There may be long queues in front of some hot activity items in the Ice and Snow World during traditional Chinese Lunar New Year and weekends, and you could visit there during other dates to avoid crowds. 

• Wendy's clients visited St. Sophia Church in Harbin in 2018
• Our customers Jenn’s group from Canada visited Ice & Snow World in Harbin, China in December 2020.
• Our customers David’s group from USA visited Sun Island in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China in December 2020.
• Our customers Yong’s group from Malaysia visited Siberian Tiger Park in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China in December 2020.

Day 3 Harbin & Harbin Departure (B, L)

Watch Activities on Ice at Jiuzhan Park - Heilongjiang Provincial Museum - Laodaowai - Goodbye to Harbin

Today, after breakfast, you will visit the Jiuzhan Park along Songhua River. Here you will watch some winter swimmers including some elders up to 60-70 years do winter swimming in the so cold water under the frozen water surface, and many people having fun on some interesting activities on ice, such as skating car, sliding, winter fishing, etc. on Songhua River.

Then, go to visit Heilongjiang Provincial Museum that keeps the European Baroque outside building from 1906. In this museum, a great number of valuable cultural relics of bronze, gold, jade, ceramics, paintings, etc. are on display to tell the 40,000-year long human history and culture of the whole Heilongjiang Province, from the remote era, to the rising and declining of different ethnic minorities, from the origin of the last empire era in Chinese history, to the modern time changes and development with the whole nation. Besides, you will see a rich array of imitating scenes and historical relics to know the life of Russian immigrants and their influence to make Harbin rich of Russian flavor today.

After that, make a historical visit to Laodaowai, where Harbin originated. This popular featured street block is so far the largest Chinese Baroque street block in China where boasts many meaningful old Baroque styled architectures with rich romantic color from early 20^th century. Walk free along those old streets and alleys to appreciate the ancient buildings with western façade but traditional Chinese courtyard and interior designs and interesting folk sculptures, and hear the good telling of the old life of Harbin people and history of Harbin in the past 100 years.

After the tour, your guide and driver will escort you to the airport or train station for your flight / train to next destination or home. Service ends!

• Songhua River Winter Swimming
• Laodaowai Street Block