Chengdu, Sichuan, China

Our final stop for the trip as well as our plane departing point, capital of Sichuan province, Chengdu.

29 Oct

After a long bus journey of 11 hours, we finally reached Xin Nan Men Bus Station (新南门车站） in Chengdu at around 6pm. We took cab from there to our hostel, Nova Traveller's Lodge. The taxi are all metered, however, it's a challege to get a taxi in Chengdu. It cost RMB14 from the bus station to the hostel.

The hostel is very good, it's new and clean. The staff are friendly. We stayed at 4-people dorm with shared toilet, however the toilet is clean and well-maintained. It cost RMB50/night for a person in 4-people-dorm. A large eating place is walking-distance away from the hostel.

The weather in Chengdu is much warmer than Jiuzhaigou, Langmusi and Xia He. It is the autumn temperature that we like so much.

30 Oct

We were so exhausted at this point of time already, hence we woke up very late today and had to forgo our plan to visit the Panda Breeding Centre. The pandas will be sleeping in the afternoon, hence there is no point of going there.

After a short discussion, we decided to go to Huang Long Xi Ancient Town (黄龙溪古镇). It's a one hour bus ride from Xin Nan Men Bus Station (新南门车站）, for RMB10/person. Please remember to buy the bus ticket back once you reach Huang Long Xi.

Welcome to Huang Long Xi!

The ancient town is very commercial now, anywhere people are selling souvenir and stuff, hence the feeling of ancient town is not there much anymore. I bought their food specialty, the black sesame cake (黑芝麻糕). It tastes quite nice.

Inside the Ancient Town

We took the last bus back to Chengdu at 6.30pm.

31 Oct

Visiting Chengdu is not complete without visiting Leshan Giant Buddha (乐山大佛）. We booked a car from the hostel for RMB600 to go to Leshan Giant Buddha (乐山大佛）. The trip took around 2 hours to reach there.

The soil and statue are red

The Buddha Statue there is really huge, it's 71m in height. We needed to queue very long to go down the stairs and see the statue from below. Alternatively, people can take the boat to go to the front part of it. The soil used to build the statue is red in colour. Apart from the statue there is nothing much else to see there. We had lunch in the restaurant nearby.

View from the top

After climbing down this stairs....

... and this is the real size!

On the way back, we alighted at Carrefour in Ba Bao Road (八宝街) to visit Ten Fu Teashop (天福茗茶） to buy some tea leaves home. I bought some of Iron Goddess tea (铁观音）, jasmine tea (茉莉茶) and green tea (竹叶青).

Today is also my birthday, Sachini, Gaya and Vij bought me a birthday cake, the hostel also gave me small cake to celebrate my birthday. A sweet small celebration to mark 25 years of my life.

1 Nov

After checking out early in the morning and store our luggage, we proceed to the Chengdu Panda Research Base and Breeding Centre (成都大熊猫繁育研究基地）. We took cab from our hostel for RMB40. It's slightly more expensive than bus, however it saved us lots of time and trouble.

The Centre houses 87 pandas, while now there are only around 2000 pandas left on earth. The pandas are very active in the morning, they are eating and playing. Apart from the giant panda, they also have the red pandas inside.

Cute butt

Lazy Bum!

The red pandas, don't look like panda at all!

After visiting the centre, we spent the rest of the day walk around the city of Chengdu and had our yuan yang hotpot (鸳鸯火锅) as our dinner before we left for airport to fly back.