About Us
Four people who got tired of watching China get misrepresented.
We're not a travel company that happened to focus on China. We're four people who know China well, care about it deeply, and built a company to share it properly.
How this started.
We met as world travelers - people who'd lived in multiple countries, spoken multiple languages, and developed a habit of going places most people talked themselves out of visiting.
China kept coming up. Not because any of us grew up there (we didn't all), but because the gap between what China actually is and how it gets portrayed in the West felt genuinely unjust. The food, the landscapes, the cultures within cultures - none of it was making it into the picture.
So we built the trip we always wanted to take. Then we built another one. Then people started asking if they could come with us. Trailblazer China is the answer to that question.
The team.
Global Outreach · Based in London
Rita
China's story wasn't being told in a way that truly reflected its richness.
Rita spent years in investment banking before a drama school detour in London changed how she thought about storytelling. The combination - rigour and narrative - turned out to be exactly what building a travel brand required.
Growing up between cultures gave her an instinct for what gets lost in translation. Trailblazer is her attempt to fix that: give Western travellers a genuine, unfiltered picture of contemporary China, and give Chinese communities a chance to tell their own story.
Watching British friends stand in a Chinese airport for the first time is, she says, still the thing that makes this worth doing.
Brand & Marketing · Based in Shanghai
Xiaomin
Travel should make you feel something, not just fill a checklist.
Xiaomin built brand operations at Popeyes and Uber before deciding that the most interesting brand problem she could work on was one she actually cared about.
She believes the gap between how China is perceived and what China actually is represents both a genuine injustice and a genuine opportunity. Trailblazer is both.
Her approach to marketing is the same as her approach to travel: specific beats generic, every time.
Expedition & Product · Based in Chengdu
Zhuzi
The best places are the ones most people talk themselves out of visiting.
Zhuzi started his first travel agency at 16. By the time he met the rest of the team, he'd documented trips across more than 100 Chinese cities, many of which hadn't seen foreign tourists for years.
He designs the itineraries. More specifically, he tests them - often alone, in remote regions, in conditions that don't appear in the final brochure. What makes it into a Trailblazer trip has earned its place.
His philosophy: a mobile life is a full life. He lives accordingly.
Operations & Culture · Based in Beijing
Yaqi
Curiosity is the most underrated travel tool.
LSE anthropology. Deloitte consulting. Fifty-plus countries visited. Yaqi brings an unusual combination of analytical rigour and genuine cultural curiosity to Trailblazer's operations.
She's also a practising Tai Chi instructor, which tells you something about her relationship to patience and precision.
What she cares about most in any trip: whether guests leave with questions, not just answers. A good trip should make the world feel bigger, not tidier.
What we actually believe about travel.
Most tours are designed around what's easy to photograph and easy to explain. We design around what's true.
That means keeping groups small enough that you can actually talk to people. It means working with local guides who have genuine relationships with their communities - not commissions from gift shops.
It means being honest about the fact that China is complicated, interesting, and not particularly well-served by 5,000-year-history soundbites.
Authenticity
Not as a marketing word. As a design constraint. Every element of a trip has to be true.
Connection
Between you and the places. Between you and the people. Between you and the other travelers in your group.
Responsibility
The Village Hearth model isn't optional. It's the foundation. Travel should leave communities better off.
Fun
We sometimes have to say this out loud: the point is to enjoy yourself. Dance parties on the Tibetan Plateau are part of the deal.
Ready for a version of China that feels vivid instead of overwhelming?
Start with a route, or start with a conversation. We'll help you figure out where to go, what kind of pace suits you, and whether Trailblazer is the right fit.
Step 1
Tell us what kind of China trip you are imagining.
Step 2
We help you narrow the route, timing, and pace.
Step 3
You get a clear recommendation on what to do next.