|
Looking for Pandas in Chengdu, China |
|
|
Friday, 08 September 2006 |
After a few days at Guangzhou, we made our way over to Chengdu over in West China. One of the things my wife wanted to do very much was to see the pandas there. Our research had told us that there was a Chengdu Panda Breeding and Research Centre about half an hour from the city centre.
However, the staff at the hotel we stayed in and even a travel agent kept on telling us that the Panda research centre was over 2 hours from the city and a trip there would cost RMB400 though we had read otherwise. So we were actually beginning to wonder whether we had been given the right facts.
However we were undeterred. We decided to go over to the Sheraton Hotel and we got help from the staff there and they confirmed what we knew. They proceeded to get a cab for us to take us there. It's one of the few places where even the bell-boy speaks English, very useful for "bananas" like me.
The taxi ride was like most taxi rides in China, quite an adventure in
itself. We arrived there in 20 minutes after the taxi driver weaved through traffic
almost at will. On the way there he was actually mumbling to himself how he was going to communicate with us as we did not let on earlier that we understood Mandarin. The bell boy at Sheraton had earlier negotiated the price and destination for us. It was a great relief for him when my wife spoke to him in Mandarin.
Entry to the park is RMB30 per person. The research centre is beautifully maintained and the lush greenery around it also acts to cool the temperature as well. If you wish a personalized tour guide, it's RMB100 per person and you can even arrange for the director of the facility to be the guide but that will cost more.
 The pandas were happily feeding when we were there and they put on
quite a nice show. They have panda cubs, sub-adult pandas and adult
pandas. In fact one of the pandas had recently been on a tour of South East Asia and had just returned from Malaysia a few days earlier. They also two enclocures of small red pandas there. As you can see from the pictures, you can get quite close to the panda, though if you want to take a picture together with it, that will cost you RMB200 more.
Found out that Microsoft had adopted one of the panda cubs and very
creatively named it "Microsoft". Guess they didn't think "Bill" or
"Steve" or even "Ray" would be a good name for the panda.
Altogether our trip to the panda base took about 3 hours and we paid
RMB125 for the taxi., RMB40 per hour for the taxi service and RMB5 for
the parking.
|
; "click me - panda")
; "click me - panda")