Bifengxia Panda Sanctuary

Today we took a day trip to Bifengxia, outside of Ya’an which is, in turn, two hours for Chengdu. We got an early start and arrived at Ya’an at 10:30 and at Bifengxia about 11:15. We then found out that the Panda Sanctuary was closed from 11:30 until 1:30, so we had some lunch before heading to the preserve. One can take a bus there from the ticket office, but we decided to take the scenic route, through the Bifengxia, or Blue Mountain Canyon. This meant starting by taking an elevator down 50 stories to the ravine base. 

 The gorge is, well, gorgeous, with waterfalls, small

 and large, 

 a few hanging coffins, 

 and a lot of stairs. 

 After 90 minutes, we arrived at the panda base. There were only a few pandas out for viewing, but they were very cute. One guy was so close that we could hear him/her chewing.

 Two other guys were rolling around with each other. 

 It was nice that Bifengxia wasn’t touristy (in fact, there were very few tourists there), but there also wasn’t as many pandas to see. One whole enclosure area was empty and there were no signs telling us not to bother walking over there.

We didn’t get back to Chengdu until 7, so it’s another late evening. Tomorrow we leave Chengdu to head for southeastern Sichuan Province.