Pandas near Beijing?

[Shadowdh]

Hi there all,

My family is visiting me in China, which is wonderfully exciting, and one of the things I would not mind doing (especially as my daughter loves them) is visiting a Panda place. I seem to remember a Panda place being close to Beijing but cannot for the life of me remember what its called or where exactly it is. So far I have managed to get quite a few of the other things we want to do either booked or at least enquiries made but this is the last thing on the list. Any info much appreciated... cheers

[roddy]

Beijing Zoo is the only one I can think of. The panda bit (for which you pay extra) is not bad, but the zoo in general is a bit bare bones. You get a great view of the tigers as they pace up and down their entirely bare cage, but it's not quite what a zoo is meant to be. Mind you, that was some years ago.

There's also some wildlife thing up next to Badaling Great Wall, not sure if they have pandas.

any excuse.

[monto]

There are only a few pandas in Beijing, at the Beijing Zoo.

As for wild pandas, the first place I can think of is Wolong (卧龙）area in Sichuan Province, about 120km from Chengdu City.

[roddy]

There's also the Breeding and Research Center, which is on the outskirts of Chengdu and much easier to get to - that's where the above video was taken. That's by far and away the best place to see pandas if you can get to Chengdu. And if I had to plan a Beijing + 1 city trip, Chengdu would be the +1.

[skylee]

If you are interested in roddy's "Panda Fight", you might also be interested in this insane comic story.

A panda's photo taken in Chengdu, the place that roddy mentioned.

[Shadowdh]

Hmmm I have heard about the places in and around Chengdu, but not sure thats going to be possible even though we will be down in Xian for a couple of days... sigh... oh well the zoo it might be then... cheers all for the info and help.