Hi, Mr Ryan,
You can refer to this to arrange your itinerary:
https://www.travelchinaguide.com/package/kunming.htm

Stone forest is close to the city proper of Kunming. You can spend half a day there. Easy to find a one-day tour there, so as a english tour. :-)

I'm glad of your visiting,Mr Ryan.I'm living in Kunming and here is my suggestions and answers to your questions:

-I suggest that you'd better spend a whole day in Kunming because it has a lot of beautiful places that worth to visit.But I don't think stone forest is worth to visit in the short time frame,its ticket is too expensive.(200 yuan,or 17.6 for each)

-It only needs about 40 minutes if you decided flying to dali,or 6-8 hours if you took a bus or train.Of course,fly to dali means more expenses,50-55 for each.

-It will take you 2 hours from dali to lijiang by bus.The railway between dali and lijiang has been built on Sept 4th.But i don't know when we can take train to lijiang.

-The traveling route between lijiang and zhongdian is about 200kilometres long,and it will take 3 hours to arrive there by bus.

-7 days is enough for your journey,but I think 9-10days would be better.And non-Mandain speaking is really a problem even for chinese people from other provinces,so you'd better employ a local guide.

Contact me at:gmail.com|hliu.1985 if you had more questions.

Wish you had a happy journey in Yunnan!

-