Having traveled extensively throughout this region of Yunnan, I came to love the people, foods and scenery Tengchong had to offer.

And with the redevelopment of Tengchong Airport, known locally as 'Hump Airport', (in reference to WW2 and the allied fliers bringing in supplies from Nepal over the Himalayas), the rise in tourism has brought a boom to this small county. A boom in terms of hotels and resorts which in turn has opened a way for developers to increase housing projects.

This boom has also a negative throw-back on increased traffic flow on roads already clogged and in dire need of repair or in some cases rebuilding.

However, the influx of new hotels and resorts now give travelers a variety of choice and level of luxury not available to past travelers.

There are three top hotels/resorts I will mention here and they are:

1. Angsana Tengchong Hot Spring Village; This is a must for any traveler wanting the best for an affordable, stress-free holiday. Trip Advisor rates this as the #1 hotel/resort in Tengchong County and their reviews speak highly of this incredible place.

2. Guanfang Hotel; I have stayed here on numerous occasions and found the rooms, food, amenities and location of this hotel, agreeable and relaxing. It was one of the first 5-star rated hotels for the county and being centrally located, this allows travelers easy access to a lot of sightseeing places; temples, local markets, eateries and historical locales.

3. Tengchong Empark Grand Hotel; This is also a hotel I have stayed in and though it is rated 5-star, the English level of the staff is painfully limited. However, the rooms and food are excellent (give the cakes in the coffee lounge a miss; tasteless and dry, but the coffee is good). The meals are buffet and there is plenty to choose from. The staff do try to show some semblance of hospitality but don't expect too much. As this is China, the level of smokers is high and this hotel will show this fact even during meals, so don't be surprised at the level of smoke in the dining area. Other than that, it is a comfortable, affordable hotel to stay in.

Next is the worst hotel/resort:

Dao Yushu Hot Spring Resort (In the valley below Mt Yunfeng or Yunfengshan); I had the fortunate meeting of two high level managers of this resort while waiting for a flight at Hump Airport and what they had to say about their resort left me shocked. Their names were Brian and Chris and they had been working in this resort from inception, through construction and opening and now it has gone into receivership. They spoke of mismanagement, poor build quality and a high level of mould/mildew in the resorts villas. The resort had almost 400 villas, a centrally located restaurant/front office, a large tourism shopping complex (now closed), and with over half of their staff laid off, a skeleton staff struggled to cover all areas.

The two managers weren't angry, they just seemed at a loss and needed to unload their burden of knowledge. They didn't want international visitors to experience the worst of hospitality when there was so much to offer elsewhere.
They were on my flight and they shared some more of the resort and by the time we landed at Changshui International Airport they looked more relaxed.

I needed to share this revelation with others as Tengchong isn't a bad place and there are excellent choices to stay, places to see and worth a look.