Trekking on our routes mostly runs two ways: fixed departures you can join, or private trips on your dates. Mountaineering is different — every climbing route we guide is private only. Not as an upsell, but because of what the mountain asks: a summit day where the guide is responsible for your rope, your route-finding and your turnaround call does not scale to a strangers’ group the way a trekking camp does.
Why private, and why per group.
The price tiers, honestly.
The cost of an expedition is mostly fixed per departure — the guide, the base camp, the rope team, the horses or porters, the road transfer from Chengdu. Split that fixed cost across one climber and the per-person number is steep; split it across four and it drops by around half. That is the whole logic behind the tiers, and we publish them rather than hiding behind a “contact us”.
On the Erfeng expedition, for example, one climber alone pays CNY 23,460; a pair pays CNY 14,550 each; four climbers pay CNY 11,310 each. The mountain, the guide and the five days are identical — what you are really buying with extra teammates is the sharing of the fixed cost. The same shape holds across the range: Yamu runs CNY 33,600 solo to CNY 14,800 each at four up; the two-week Zhongshan expedition runs CNY 109,600 solo to CNY 62,400 each.
What is in the price.
Guiding from Chengdu to Chengdu, including the summit day itself. Camp lodging and camp food — breakfasts and dinners while camping, basic mountain food above base camp. Shared climbing gear: ropes and the group kit. The carrying: on the routes where horses cannot reach, porters move the camps, and on Yamu the gear carrying, permits and medical support are all inside the quoted number. Road transport and the Chengdu bookends are in too.
What is not.
Your personal climbing kit — crampons, harness, helmet, boots, ice axe. If you do not own it yet, it can be arranged; you do not need to fly a duffel of spikes across the world for a first snow peak. Also outside: lunches in the cities, flights and trains, a summit certificate fee where the mountain association issues one, and tips. One special case is worth flagging early: the Zhongshan expedition is guided in Chinese by default, and an English-speaking guide can be added at extra cost — tell us at the brief stage so it is in the quote, not a surprise on the glacier.
Deposit and cancellation.
Twenty percent of the trip cost confirms a booking. Cancel sixty days or more before departure and the deposit comes back in full; between thirty and sixty days, half; inside thirty days there is no refund — by then the guide, camps and carrying crew are committed to your dates. It is the same policy shape whether the expedition is five days or fourteen, and we would rather print it than negotiate it.
If you are weighing private against a join-in trek rather than choosing mountains, the general mechanics are compared in Join-in or private; and if you are still picking which peak, the staircase from a first 5,000er upward is mapped in Your first 6,000-metre peak.
Price a mountain?
The Erfeng expedition, with the full tier table
The Zhongshan expedition, 14 days
Join-in or private: how departures work
What a custom journey costs