The China Travel Blog isn't the only new kid on the China blogosphere block. In fact, our big brother (of sorts) is also sporting a shiny new blog. That's right, our sponsor, Ctrip English, has launched Ctripper, a slick piece of work designed to keep China travel hounds in the know about the latest deals and developments to emerge from Ctrip Labs. ("Your China, Your Way," is the Ctripper slogan... we'd like ours with extra cheese, please!).

Anyway, we highly suggest subscribing to the Ctripper RSS feed if you have any interest at all in stretching your travel yuan (or compulsively staring at the Ctripper home page and hitting "refresh" every five minutes... your choice).

Coley does Inner Mongolia. (Get great deals on Mongolian ponies with Ctrip English. Book Now... if you know what's good for you.)

And if we're not convincing you (they are our sponsor, after all... we're probably gonna say nice things about them...) then check out two recent US radio interviews with one Mr. Coley Dale, Ctrip English business development shifu and big-time China traveler (he's bicycling around  Xinjiang in October and thinking about where he'll put the hot tub in his future Moganshan summer farmhouse as we type).

First, Coley gets up really early (or stays up really late) to chat with Kevin & Sue McCarthy of “The Travel Planners” radio show out of St. Louis. Kevin supposes that Coley's "got the best job in the world" and rightly describes Coley as "a China travel expert" before rhapsodizing about how Shanghai's super-Tomorrowland skyline put thoughts of the Jetsons and flying cars in his head (Coley, despite the 23 hour time difference and World Cup hangover, snappily responds to the flying car quip: "We've got those in R&D… it should be another couple of years...").

The second is an interview with Pauline Frommer of the Frommer's travel guide empire, and Coley lays more China travel wisdom on the American masses, providing helpful tips on how to find good hotel deals in China's crowded (and sometimes chaotic, especially to newcomers) hospitality market, where to go for natural beauty (Yunnan, y'all!) and how to make the best use of Ctrip, which is, as he puts it,  "Expedia, Orbitz and Travelocity rolled into one" when it comes to booking online travel in the Middle Kingdom.

Listen and learn...