Sort your payments and data in Shanghai before you head inland

This is the easiest city in the mainland to get set up in: staff are used to foreign cards, most counters can explain themselves in English, and there is a fallback within walking distance when something does not work.

Use the first day to link a card in Alipay or WeChat Pay, add the metro QR, buy the data package you plan to use, and test all three on something small. Doing this in Shanghai takes an hour. Doing it for the first time in a small city takes a day and a lot of pointing.