We spent xmas 2007 at the Banyan Tree Lijiang. My mother, sister and my fiancee and I stayed in two deluxe garden villas. The weather was very cold, around 8-12 degrees celcius.

Pros: great villas, great service, great comfortable cool weather.
Cons: not much to do in Lijiang, recommend no more than 3 days.

Hotel: fantastic service all around, they go the extra mile to try and meet all customer's needs. Food was pretty good, there really are only 2 restaurants. The Chinese restaurant is spectacular, and western restaurant is good too.

Complaints: I disliked the xmas set dinner - it was about US$100 per person which is not a problem, but the service was slow, food was cold and it was not the same set menu as had been advertised.

We recommend this hotel to others, its obviously not for those who want to go to the beach, sit in hot weather, although I'm sure the spring/summers would be nice. Lijiang itself is pretty decent, and it's not too crowded.

Happy to answer questions or thoughts. Feel free to hit us up.

Thanks

We live in Shanghai and travel pretty extensively in China. Not only was the property beautiful, with an amazing view of the snow mountain, the service was impeccable. Ask for a villa at the front row with full view of the snow mountain. It is such a joy to wake up each morning staring at the snow mountain. The rooms are well thought through, down to the details and the bed has a wonderful electric heating. The bathroom is huge with the biggest bath we have ever seen. The Chinese restuarant serves good quality food, better than the western restuarnt. We had stayed 2 nights in the ancient city and 2 nights at Banyan Tree which we thought was a good mix.

As a gift to my parents, we decided to give them two nights over Christmas at the Banyan Tree Lijiang. We were all staying somewhere else, and when I went to the hotel directly (which is 20 mins from the city), they miraculously had one villa available. It was superb. I had informed them it was my mother's birthday, so when my parent's arrived, they found their room beautifully and tastefully decorated, with flowers and leaves spelling 'Happy Birthday' on the bed, a complimentary bottle of wine and a birthday cake. Fresh fruit and a real gingerbread house were thrown in for Christmas. What style!

The villa's themselves are all one would ever need, the Jacuzzi is blazing hot (very nice when it's freezing outside), and the view of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain is spectacular as is the rain shower.

The staff could not be friendlier: they all addressed us by name (even us, the 'kids' when we visited our parents). The Spa massage therapist even worked longer to accommodate my mom: we had wanted to offer her a massage (the Spa is featured in Condé Nast Traveler’s Hot List 2007), but they were fully booked. But when they learned it was her birthday, they offered to do one ‘after hours’!

We had a spectacular 8-course Christmas Eve dinner in the Western restaurant, where another birthday cake was brought out. The Chinese restaurant is excellent as well, but seems to cater only to Chinese which is a pity! The breakfast buffet is pricy, but very diverse.

In all, a magnificent luxurious stay. The attention to detail and friendliness of the staff is unrivalled, and made it a very memorable stay for all of us.

Booked a Winter Spa promotion package with Banyan which includes 2 nights at Lijiang and 2 nights at Ringha (Zhongdian), for our honeymoon.

Prior to checking in to Banyan Lijiang, we did a hike up Tiger Leaping Gorge (stayed in old town and 1 night in Tea Horse Guesthouse on top of the gorge), and was so looking forward to a relaxing spa and stay at Banyan.

The bad experiences we encountered:
1) Hotel pickup from Old Town - despite 2 calls to Banyan Tree to pick us up at a specific landmark in Old Town (water wheel), they failed to do so. Instead, we were told to drag our luggages and our weary legs (after our 2 days hike) to the Old Town carpark where the driver was "waiting" for us.... disappointing service for the price we had to fork out for this resort.

2) Spa... despite booking a package which includes a free spa for 2...and discounted price for ala-carte spa treatment...we were told by BT staff that we had no spa entitlements under our package!! Despite sending them the url page describing the package we had booked (at their request), they insisted on witholding our entitlement. Only after calling our travel agent back in our country did our travel agent manage to confirm our spa entitlement (note, we had to follow up on this ourselves, BT Lijiang left the matter closed). By then we are already in Ringha.

We felt Banyan Lijiang was extremely inflexible in their handling of the matter -despite knowing that we were on our honeymoon, and after having obtained details of our travel package. Not once did they consider any alternative except to say no - extremely disappointing service from a resort that prides themselves on service quality. Their inaction effectively ruined our honeymoon stay at BT Lijiang. Not to say we were left to nurse our aching limbs on our own.

BUT the story does not end here!! In Ringha, when we checked with the reception on our spa package, we were told that we only have a free spa for one person!! Ridiculous as this is our honeymoon trip, and despite paying for the "Winter Promotion" which rightly includes spa for 2!! Again there is poor communication between staff at both resorts.

All in all, despite luxurious resort facilities, the experience leaves much to be desired from Banyan Tree. We will think twice before ever staying at another BT resort again.