Chengdu (China)

After docking in Chongqing, we made our way by bus to the city of Chengdu, about 350 kms away. Chengu was panda-monium...yes our main reason for going there was to finally track down the Giant Panda Bear that eluded us in Hong Kong. A few kilometers outside of the city is the world's largest Giant Panda Bear Eco-Park. It is a 105 hectares and contains about 40 Giant Pandas. There are expansion plans for the park to become 200 hectares and it is a vital research tool into the life and habits of these very solitary animals. The Pandas are researched, observed, bred and protected in this park.

We visited the Park at feeding time, which is around 9:30 a.m. and enjoyed a few hours of watching the bears munch on bamboo, their favourite food. Apparently they eat about 20 kgs a day in order to sustain themselves. That's a lot of food. They are also known to be very picky eaters and will only eat about 20 of China's 300 species of bamboo. We witnessed their pickiness as the workers piled heaps of bamboo next to them and they matter of factly rummaged through picking out what they wanted, sampled and sometimes discarded a branch of bamboo after only one bite in search of another one more to their liking. The bears at this park should count themselves lucky that they have servants dedicated to searching out food to their precise taste preferences! The bears in the wild spend 10 – 16 hours a day searching out food. Then they sleep.

Giant Panda bears have been around for at least 600,000, some say as much as 1 million to 3 million years, and at some point evolved from carnivores to herbivores. Unfortunately they can only absorb about 2% of the nutrients from the bamboo which accounts for why they have to eat so much of it and also why they are so notoriously lazy. Their laziness is actually required in order to conserve as much energy as possible and who can argue with that...sleeping is a fabulous pass time. This fella truly has the Life of Riley and even has a swing to help him relax. I think he's gotten used to the luxuries in this park.

And here are the Three Bears. There are only about 1,000 Giant Pandas left in the world, surprising for an animal that is the only “living fossil” from the Pleistocene period. They are remarkably adaptable and have even developed a pseudo thumb during their evolution in order to help them hold bamboo while they eat it. Their relative the bear can only hold items between its paws and cannot clutch things like the Panda. Scientists have apparently argued for years whether they belong to the bear family, the raccoon family or a separate class distinction of their own. In the wild these bears are very solitary animals and have a very difficult time finding one another, especially since so many of their natural habitats have been destroyed. These three have no problem finding each other and are also not the least bit phased by all of the tourists gawking at them. Life is good for them. If you are interested click on Giant Panda Bear Breeding Research Base to visit the website of this park.


After a fun filled morning of watching Pandas we took in a Sichuan opera, a 200 year old tradition. Opera in the province of Sichuan has a different meaning than that at home. Although it started off with high pitched singing and dramatic acts, it also included gymnastics, comedy routines, puppetry, very complicated hand shadowry and traditional ceremonies such as Changing of the Mask. It was very entertaining and we were actually able to follow along as they placed electronic boards around the sidelines with basic English translations.