Among Pandas: Chengdu
The journey continues.
For international visitors to Wolong, the gateway is Chengdu. I was there twice during my recent panda adventure.
The first time, flying in from Guangzhou, was a mere stopover, for me to meet my tour guide and driver who fetched me from the airport before taking me to lunch, and then straight onto Wolong.
The second time, after my mega adventure in Wolong, was longer - I stayed in Chengdu for three whole days and did various touristy things, like visit the Dujiangyan Irrigation System and the Sitting Buddha at Leshan, and of course, the Panda Reserve in Chengdu.
By the time I left Wolong, I was rather tired, and the subsequent three days in Chengdu suffered. But to be honest, I’m not a very touristy kind of person, at least not with the usual tourist attractions. I’ve always gone with my own itineraries wherever I visited - as a result, paying more than the usual tourist.
I have no pictures of the Dujiangyan Irrigation System. We visited on the way from Wolong to Chengdu, and all I remembered was there was a lot of walking, some of it on steps going down, and some of it across a rope suspension bridge that swayed, and quite badly because of some idiot who decided to agitate the bridge without thought to the elderly (more elderly than me) among the tourists present. If you want to know more, you can read about it here, and see some nice pictures, too, including one of the suspension bridge. Actually, the walk also included a nice stroll through a park towards the exit.
The walking experience got me questioning my tour guide about what to expect for the visit to the Sitting Buddha. She said yes, there would be quite a bit of walking, and quite a bit of it up some steps to go around the shoulder of the Sitting Buddha, and then down, etc. No way was I going to do all that walking (and outside in the sun, too). She then said there was an alternative, which was to see the Sitting Buddha from a boat. Without hesitation, I told her we’d go on the boat.
Unlike the visit to the irrigation system, I did take some pictures at Leshan.
 |
You can see how huge the statue is, compared to the people filing past at its feet. Here’s a close-up of the right foot:
 |
Apparently, we would also be visiting the Sleeping Buddha statue. When I asked my tour guide where it was located, as I couldn’t see another statue in the vicinity, she said to wait, the boat would take us there. After a short ride, everyone turned to face where we’d last seen the Sitting Buddha, and there it was, the Sleeping Buddha:
 |
It’s actually just the combination of three hilly outcrops that produces a silhouette of a sleeping Buddha, which really looks impressive in “person”, but less so in a picture.
I finally got to the Chengdu Panda Reserve on my last full day in Chengdu. After my glorious four days in Wolong, this was almost an anti-climax. But for many people who do not know about Wolong, or do not wish to travel further for a fuller panda experience, the Chengdu Panda Reserve, located near the city (instead of out and up in the mountains), is a great introduction to giant pandas. In fact, if Chengdu and Wolong were to work together, there could be information at Chengdu for visitors who want more and are willing to go further to Wolong. As it turned out, I tried to do my bit by sharing about my Wolong volunteer experience with some of the visitors sharing the buggy ride with me. I hope it piqued their curiosity to find out more about Wolong.
Like Wolong, Chengdu has a kindergarten area, very lush and very green - it reminded me of the giant panda habitat at the San Diego Zoo.
 |
 |
The one major difference is that in San Diego Zoo, there is usually just one panda cub up in the trees, whereas in Chengdu, it’s at least two panda cubs.
 |
And then, there were the older pandas, always the ideal balm for stressed hoomans!
 |
 |
It was a nice sunny morning when I visited, which this panda took full advantage of:
 |
But not for long. By 9:30 a.m., it was getting too hot for the furry cuties to be outside, and the keepers started calling for them to return indoors. Those that did not comply, got carried in.
 |
So, yeah, it was a short visit to the Chengdu Panda Reserve for me. But I’d had my fill of giant pandas - well, this trip, at least - and I was not sorry to leave and return to the cool indoors of the hotel and the free Internet service in the lobby lounge.
