One can take the taxis too but they might not know the way to your hotel unless the driver is a local driver and they dont speak english. Best to print out the name of your hotel and location in mandarin. You can read information about tips on getting taxis in Guangzhou from this very useful website. According to the website, three taxis companies are the yellow taxis of the Baiyun Group, the blue taxis of the Guangjun Group, and the maroon taxis of Guangzhou Transportation Group. So the best bet was to take the yellow taxi as the drivers are local Guangzhou citizens and familiar with the city.
The fare for airport shuttle bus to city starts from CNY20 (S$1=CNY4.80). You can find out more from this website.
The taxi fare to city is about CNY100 to Haizhu Square where my hotel is located.
I took the metro and it costs me only CNY7 - really very worth it and fuss free. I need to change the train from Line 3(orange) to Line 2 (Blue) to go to Haizhu Square. Just alight at Jiehewanggang and cross over to the other side of the station and take the train to Haizhu Square. They would announce in both languages at each station. Best to go during weekdays where the train is not crowded.
Tickets can be purchased from the ticket machine at the station. The machine accepts only CNY1 (coin), CNY5 (note) and CNY10(note). If you dont have the notes, you can change with the station personnel. The one thing I dont like was that the notes they change are really very old and dirty. Chances are that hotels and restaurants would change newer notes to you.
In the metro train cabin, we can see racks where we can put our suitcase but I am the worried type, kept my suitcase close to me lol. After hearing about so many unsafe and bad stories about Guangzhou was abit worried and scared before my trip. But all these were unfounded, Guangzhou was nice and beautiful and safer than I expected but still we got to be vigilant just like when you visit any country. I was advised to dress down and not to carry handbag, put my money in different pockets but I saw their locals carrying handbags and haversacks on their back and they dressed very fashionably. I looked out of place lol.
In my opinion, Guangzhou City looked just like Hongkong and you cant really differentiate the two cities they both speak the same cantonese languages but there are many migrant workers from other provinces who came down to Guangzhou City to work and make a living and they speak mostly mandarin only.
Surprising their metro trains are very clean , I expected to see cockroaches, etc hahaha but then the last time I visited Guangzhou was in 1986. So much changes, back then they dont even have the metro and there were hundreds of those big black bicycles. But now I dont even see a single big black bicycle and only a handful of bicycles. Most of them commuted via the bus, metro, taxis or have their own cars. Traffic jams are so common in Guangzhou City cause most of them own cars. The best was to take the metro to reach your destination faster but do note you have to climb some stairs/steps to ground level from the metro station as most stations dont have lifts. If I live here for another month, am sure to lose weight and live a longer life, good exercises hahaha.
The lights will light up on the board to show the destination.
After alighting from the train, we looked at the signboard inside the station to locate which exit to use to find our hotel.
There's also a map inside the metro train station to show the location of the buildings around Haizhu Square. Best to take a photo of the map so that when you are lost you can looked into your camera screen and find your way around. I will be posting this map again when I need to explain another place where I visited in my future posts.
I saw my hotel (circled in the photo). Please note that you need to climb some stairs/steps to ground level, most stations dont have lifts. So if you have heavy and big luggages best to take the taxis or airport shuttle bus to your hotel.
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