China: Sichuan's Pandas, Jiuzhaigou and Emeishan

Arrive in Chengdu

Chengdu Tianfu (TFU) or Shuangliu (CTU) airport to central Chengdu, then the Kuanzhai Alleys

• Welcome dinner
• Nuit : Chengdu
• Environ 1 h de route

Après-midi

The afternoon is free to rest after the flight.

Soir

In the early evening the group meets for a briefing on the week ahead: the early start for the pandas, the train up to Jiuzhaigou, what altitude feels like, how to pay with your phone in China and why you carry your passport each day. Then your guide walks you through the Kuanzhai Alleys, three restored Qing-era lanes of grey-brick courtyard houses, lit up after dark, to a local restaurant for a welcome dinner of Sichuan dishes shared around one table: mapo tofu, twice-cooked pork, dan dan noodles, and milder plates for anyone still getting used to the chili and the numbing Sichuan pepper. If your flight lands late, we meet you at breakfast instead.

Compris

• Pick-up at Chengdu Tianfu (TFU) or Shuangliu (CTU) airport
• Evening briefing with your guide
• Walk through the Kuanzhai Alleys
• Welcome dinner of Sichuan dishes

Pandas at opening, a cooking class and Sichuan opera

Chengdu to the giant panda base and back, a cooking class, People's Park, then Sichuan opera

• Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
• Nuit : Chengdu
• Environ 1 h de route

Matin

Giant pandas are most active in the cool of the morning, when keepers bring fresh bamboo, so we leave at 7 am for the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding, about half an hour north of the centre, and walk in as it opens at 7:30. Tickets are booked ahead in your name. Paths wind through bamboo groves past outdoor enclosures, where adults feed, climb and doze, and the nursery houses, where young pandas are often on view. Red pandas have their own wooded area.

Après-midi

By late morning the pandas settle down to sleep, and we drive back into the city to a neighbourhood market with a local cooking school, buying chilies, Sichuan pepper and greens from the stalls, then cook kung pao chicken and mapo tofu, which become lunch. In the afternoon we sit with locals in a People's Park teahouse over jasmine tea, mahjong clattering around us.

Soir

After a free hour, the evening is Sichuan opera, with fire-breathing and the masks of face-changing switching in a blink.

Compris

• The Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding at opening, with your guide
• Market visit and Sichuan cooking class, with lunch
• Tea in a People's Park teahouse
• Sichuan opera with face-changing

High-speed train to Jiuzhaigou

Chengdu to Huanglong Jiuzhai station by high-speed train, then by road to Jiuzhaigou

• Petit-déjeuner et repas du soir
• Nuit : Jiuzhaigou
• Environ 2.5 h de route

Matin

After breakfast our vehicle takes the group and the luggage to the station, and your guide steers everyone through the ticket and security checks. The high-speed line to Jiuzhaigou opened in 2024 and cut a ten-hour mountain drive to a train ride of about two hours, depending on the train, climbing out of the Sichuan Basin through long tunnels into the valleys of the Min River and onto the high plateau. At Huanglong Jiuzhai station, at roughly 3,000 m, our vehicle meets us for the drive of about an hour and three quarters, down through Tibetan and Qiang villages with prayer flags strung over the river, to Zhangzha, the small town at the gate of Jiuzhaigou, at about 2,000 m.

Après-midi

Lunch is your choice when we arrive. The afternoon is deliberately free, to rest and let your body adjust to the height before tomorrow's long day.

Soir

In the evening we eat together at a local restaurant: yak meat, highland barley bread and butter tea beside Sichuan dishes.

Compris

• Transfer to the Chengdu station with your guide
• Reserved seats on the high-speed train to Huanglong Jiuzhai
• Transfer from the station to Jiuzhaigou
• Dinner of local Tibetan and Sichuan dishes

A full day in the Jiuzhaigou valley

Jiuzhaigou park gate by park bus to the head of the Rize valley, down to Nuorilang, Long Lake, then down the Shuzheng valley

• Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
• Nuit : Jiuzhaigou
• Environ 30 min de route

Après-midi

Lunch is at Nuorilang, the hub where the valleys meet. In the afternoon the bus takes us up the Zechawa valley to Long Lake, the highest at about 3,060 m, and the Five-Coloured Pool, then we finish on foot down the Shuzheng valley past Nuorilang Falls and the lakes below.

Soir

Back at the hotel by late afternoon; the evening is free.

Compris

• Jiuzhaigou entry and the park bus, at opening, with your guide
• The Rize valley: Arrow Bamboo Lake, Panda Lake, Five Flower Lake and Pearl Shoal
• The Zechawa valley: Long Lake and the Five-Coloured Pool
• The Shuzheng valley and Nuorilang Falls
• Lunch at Nuorilang

Back down the mountains to Leshan

Jiuzhaigou to Huanglong Jiuzhai station, the high-speed train to Chengdu, then by road to Leshan

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Leshan
• Environ 4 h de route

Matin

A slower morning with a late breakfast, then our vehicle takes us back up to Huanglong Jiuzhai station, about an hour and three quarters, for the high-speed train down to Chengdu, about two hours. The ride and the road are split by the train, so no one sits in a vehicle for long.

Après-midi

In Chengdu we sit down to lunch near the station, a bowl of noodles or a plate of Sichuan dumplings, while our vehicle loads the luggage, then drive about two hours south across the Sichuan Basin to Leshan, where three rivers meet: the Min, the Dadu and the Qingyi.

Soir

We check in at a hotel near the river front in the late afternoon, and at dusk your guide walks the group along the embankment and into the lanes for a dinner of Leshan snacks: bobo chicken, skewers dipped from a pot of cold chili oil, sweet-skin duck and qiaojiao beef soup. The night is short; the Buddha opens early.

Compris

• Transfer to Huanglong Jiuzhai station
• Reserved seats on the high-speed train to Chengdu
• Lunch in Chengdu
• Transfer from Chengdu to Leshan
• River-front walk and a dinner of Leshan snacks

The Leshan Giant Buddha, then up Emeishan

Leshan Giant Buddha and a river boat, Baoguo Temple, then by scenic-area bus and the Jinding cableway, or the route open on the day, to the Golden Summit

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Emeishan Golden Summit
• Environ 2.5 h de route

Après-midi

We drive about 45 minutes to Baoguo, the town at the foot of Emeishan, one of China's four sacred Buddhist mountains, for a vegetarian lunch and a walk round Baoguo Temple.

Soir

In the afternoon the scenic-area bus climbs to the upper bus station, and a stepped path of about 1.5 km and the Jinding cableway, or whichever route is open on the day, take us to the Golden Summit at 3,079 m for sunset. Dinner and the night are at a guesthouse on top, confirmed once the summit route is.

Compris

• The Leshan Giant Buddha at opening, with your guide, and the Nine-Turn Plank Road
• River boat past the Buddha
• Vegetarian lunch and Baoguo Temple
• Emeishan scenic-area entry and bus
• The Jinding cableway, or the route open on the day, to the Golden Summit
• Sunset at the Golden Summit
• Dinner at the summit

Dawn on the Golden Summit, down past Wannian Temple

Golden Summit at dawn, down by cableway (or the route open) and scenic-area bus to Wannian, Wannian Temple by cable car, the walk to Qingyin Pavilion, then Baoguo

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Emeishan
• Environ 1.5 h de route

Matin

Your guide knocks before dawn, and we walk a few minutes to the terrace below the gilded statue of Samantabhadra, the bodhisattva of this mountain, to watch the sun come up over the sea of clouds. On clear mornings the snow peaks of the Gongga range stand on the western skyline; on cloudy ones the clouds below are the show. Breakfast warms everyone up, then the cableway, or the route open on the day, and the scenic-area bus take us down to Wannian. A second cable car climbs to Wannian Temple, whose domed brick hall shelters a bronze Samantabhadra on a white elephant cast in 980.

Après-midi

Lunch is on the mountain, then the cable car takes us back down and a forest path of about forty minutes from the Wannian car park, past streams and the Tibetan macaques of the lower slopes, leads to Qingyin Pavilion, where two streams meet.

Soir

The bus takes us down to a hotel in Baoguo for a rest, and the group meets for a farewell dinner.

Compris

• Sunrise at the Golden Summit
• Cableway, or the route open on the day, and scenic-area bus down to Wannian
• The Wannian cable car up to Wannian Temple and back
• Wannian Temple with your guide
• Lunch on the mountain
• The forest walk to Qingyin Pavilion
• Farewell dinner

Depart from Chengdu

A free morning in Baoguo, then by road to Chengdu Tianfu (TFU) or Shuangliu (CTU) airport

• Petit-déjeuner
• Environ 3 h de route

Matin

The last morning is yours, with no early start after the summit dawn. Breakfast at the hotel, then time for a last walk to Baoguo Temple, a cup of Emei's own green tea, or a soak at one of the hot-spring hotels at the foot of the mountain. Late in the morning, or at the time your flight needs, our vehicle drives you back to Chengdu: about two and a quarter hours to Shuangliu (CTU) and about two and three quarters to Tianfu (TFU), on the expressway across the flat farmland of the basin.

Soir

If you would rather spend an extra night in Chengdu, for the Wenshu Monastery, a hotpot supper or another morning with the pandas, we can add a night at the trip hotel and drop you in the city instead. For international flights, book a departure after about 4:30 pm, which lets us leave Baoguo around 10 am and gives you three hours at the airport.

Compris

• Drop-off at Chengdu Tianfu (TFU) or Shuangliu (CTU) airport, or at a hotel in central Chengdu