Welcome to Sìchuān
It's fitting that an ancient form of opera and magic called biànliǎn (face-changing) originated here, for Sìchuān (四川) is a land of many guises.Capital Chéngdū shows a modern face, but just beyond its bustling ring roads you'll find a more traditional landscape of mist-shrouded, sacred mountains, and a countryside scattered with ancient villages and cliffs of carved Buddhas. Central Sìchuān is also home to the giant... Read More
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Sìchuān activities
Half-Day Chengdu Panda Breeding Center Tour
Spend your day with some loveable creatures that will never fail to capture your heart. A hotel pickup will take you to either the Chengdu Panda Breeding Center or the Dujiangyan Giant Panda Center, non-profit research and breeding facilities for giant pandas and other rare animals that strives to simulate a natural environment for these creatures. Your expert guide will take you through the center to get a full overview of a panda’s development. Learn about the progression from a baby panda to a full grown panda with a visit to the baby panda area, where you’ll admire these small and delicate creatures. Despite their age and size, you’ll see how full of life and energy they are! Then, head to the area that keeps the young adult pandas. Learn how adolescent pandas, between the ages of one and five, spend this important maturity period. Finally, you’ll witness the giant panda in all its full-grown glory at the adult area. Take pictures of these endangered species eating bamboo, sleeping and playing with one another.Keep an eye out for the red pandas among the trees or stretched out on a branch with their legs dangling. Choose to feed and take photos with them (see more below). After a morning of admiring these lovable animals, you’ll be transported back to your hotel. Upgrade to hold a baby giant panda! Take advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hold an adorable baby giant panda, which are six months to one year old, and get your photo taken! This unique experience takes place at the more intimate Dujiangyan Giant Panda Center to let you admire these rare, endangered creatures up close. Plus, all of the money will be donated to the non-profit Dujiangyan Giant Panda Center for research. Option only available if conditions are favorable.
Experience Beijing: Chinese Cooking Class and Market Tour
Meet your guide at Deng Cao Hutong in the morning and head to a nearby food market for a 1.5-hour walking tour. Browse fresh produce and listen as your guide, a professional cooking instructor, explains the different kinds of vegetables, spices and sauces. Gather up and purchase your fresh ingredients (included) and make your way down a hutong (alleyway) to a local family’s home to begin your class.Depending on the day, your instructor teaches you to make dim sum — small savory snacks that contain a variety of fillings; or you learn to make main dishes, ranging from Sichuan-inspired to Cantonese and others. One day per week your chef prepares a vegetarian menu, which will be advised when you make your booking. Have the option to switch to another day if you wish.Discover kitchen skills, like how to use woks and cleavers, and learn how to make delicious flavorful dishes. When cooking dim sum, you’ll make two tasty selections, which may include soup dumplings, wontons, egg tarts, barbequed pork buns, sweet sesame rolls, dandan noodles or stir-fried noodles.In the class on main-course options, your instructor will demonstrate how to make four meat or vegetable dishes, and you’ll practice making three of the selections. The inspiration for the flavors range from Sichuan-inspired to Cantonese and other regional cuisines. Meals that you make may include kung pao chicken, steamed fish with ginger, stir-fried beef and peppers, spicy chicken salad and sweet and sour pork. At least one vegetarian dish is prepared each day. When you’re finished cooking, relax in the 150-year-old Qing dynasty-era courtyard and enjoy the meal you’ve created!To see the map of your tour, click on the View Additional Info button below.
Panda Rescue Center Volunteer for a Day
China’s most symbolic animal is now an endangered species numbering just 2,000. Since 2011, the Dujiangyan Giant Panda Center, part of the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda (CCRCGP), has made a home for injured and elderly bears, treated with utmost care in specialized facilities on a secluded, 126-acre (51-hectare) reserve of bamboo and parkland at the foot of a sacred mountain. Departing from your hotel after morning pickup, drive by private vehicle for approximately 1.5 hours to the non-profit rescue and research center. Receive a commemorative t-shirt, then switch vehicles and ride an excursion bus up to the top of the site, where you can observe resident pandas going about their daily lives.Meet the panda keepers who work to create a natural environment for China’s most beloved animals, and receive a short training session. You can participate in two panda feedings — one in the morning and one in the afternoon — washing and carrying fresh bamboo, and preparing food like fruit, carrots and panda cakes. These nutritional treats are made with shredded bamboo mixed by hand with rice and egg to create a large, solid cake.After your first volunteer session, enjoy your own lunch, provided for you at the center’s cafeteria.Spend about an hour visiting the panda gardens before you resume your volunteer work. Your guide provides a complete overview of panda development so you can understand the bears’ progression from infancy to adulthood. Stop at the sub-adult garden, where the adolescent pandas between the ages of one and five years old hang out. Then observe full-grown giant pandas in the adult area, where the bears can be seen eating bamboo, sleeping and frolicking about. In the afternoon, you’ll help clean the pandas’ indoor and outdoor enclosures, and may perhaps learn to record panda behavior or even assist with weighing the pandas (depending on the caretaker's schedule). After the pandas’ second feeding, take a break from your volunteer duties to walk around the panda center at leisure. You are free to use the computers and watch panda videos at the volunteer service center if you’d like.Please note: The center limits direct contact with the animals to ensure their well-being. The duties of your volunteer service may be changed due to the needs on any given day, and are not guaranteed.After a full day helping out with these impressive animals, you’ll receive a volunteer certificate and the satisfaction of contributing to a great cause. At the end of your tour, you’re transferred back to your hotel in Chengdu by private vehicle.
Private Tour: Day Trip to the Leshan Grand Buddha from Chengdu
A private vehicle will pick you up from your Chengdu hotel and take you on a two-hour drive to the Leshan Grand Buddha. Upon arrival at Leshan, indulge in a delicious Chinese lunch at a popular local restaurant. Afterwards, your guide will lead you to the Grand Buddha Temple (Lingyun Temple), located behind the Grand Buddha’s head. Marvel at the elaborate construction of its coiled hair, which is made up of around 1,020 twisted buns. Walk inside and marvel at the intricate sculptures and wall designs of the temple.Then, follow your guide down the trail toward the left of the Grand Buddha. This walk usually takes approximately 30 minutes, but is flexible depending on any rest or photo stops you may want to make. Standing at an impressive 233 feet (71 meters) high and 92 feet (28 meters) wide, it is by far the largest carved Buddha sculpture in the entire world! Admire the grandeur of this structure as it towers over you.Your guide will then lead you on another 30-minute walk up the trail on the right side of the Buddha to reach another temple. Walk inside the Wuyou Temple, a pink-walled building housing an abundance of calligraphic paintings, sculptures of terracotta monks and various other Buddhist artifacts. Follow your guide to the Arhat Hall, where you will see upwards of 500 Arhat statues. Outside the temple, take in magnificent aerial views of the Buddha, the surrounding forest and the Min River, Qingyi River and Dadu River converging below.For an alternative view of the Grand Buddha, take a boat cruise on the river (at own expense). After a full day of touring this World Heritage Site, sit back and relax as your private transport drives you back to your Chengdu hotel.
Private Leshan Giant Buddha Day Tour from Chengdu with High-speed Train Transfer
Once you are picked up by your guide at your Chengdu hotel, you will head to the modern Chengdu Train Station to catch the high-speed train to Leshan.During the one-hour train ride, you can mingle with locals and enjoy the idyllic landscape of the Chengdu countryside, which changes throughout seasons - carpets of yellow rapeseed flowers in spring, the greenery of rice paddies at summer, or colorful harvesting in the autumn. Once you arrive at Leshan, you will head to the Giant Buddha Park. The Leshan Giant Buddha is the biggest Buddha statue in the world – a 71-meter (233 ft) tall stone statue, built during 713 AD-803 AD by the Tang Dynasty. It is carved out of a cliff face and lies at the confluence of three rivers in the Mount Emei Scenic Area. Mount Emei and the Leshan Buddha were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996. You will first climb 300 steps to the top of Lingyun Hill, a 20-30 minute journey. On the way, you will stop to see the Black Dragon Pond and many ancient stone carvings and Buddhist sculptures. From the top of Lingyun Hill, you will view three rivers: Min, Qingyi and Dadu river as they come together and you can explore Buddhist sculptures and murals inside Lingyun Temple. You will then descend along the red sand cliff road to view the phenomenal Leshan Giant Buddha from the bottom, and climb up at the opposite side of the hill.The walk will take around 30-40 minutes. From there, you walk to lunch in a local restaurant before visiting the Wuyou Temple, which has not been significantly restored and so retains its tranquil Buddhist atmosphere. The Giant Buddha and the temple are separated by the Min river, and you will walk around 20 minutes, crossing the Haoshang bridge. Once there, you will have an hour or so to enjoy the ancient courtyard, visit the hall dedicated to the Wuyou Buddha (a frightful-looking figure that was cast in India at around 618-907), and enjoy the Arhats Hall with beautifully-painted life-size clay figures of 500 Buddha’s disciples.Your tour ends late in the afternoon, if time permit,your guide will also show you the neighborhood of old Leshan city before return to the train station for the relaxing high-speed train journey back to Chengdu.Your guide will accompany you back to your hotel.
All Inclusive Private Day Tour: Amazing Shanghai Highlights
Meet your knowledgeable guide at your hotel lobby and start your exciting sightseeing tour from Fuxing Park where you will see locals dancing and practicing meditation and Tai Chi as their morning exercise. Some are also gathering to play cards and catching up with friends. It is lovely spot to experience the local life. Next, head to the Tianzifang in former French concession, an area of well-preserved old style stone houses with lots of interesting shops, cafes and restaurants. The houses are all reconstructed from the old residential blocks. Stroll through the alleyways and have a leisure time enjoying the art, food and souvenirs. Revitalize yourself with a delicious lunch in a local restaurant where you can have a bit of famous "Xiao Long Bao" (soup dumpling) and other delicious dishes. In the afternoon, you will visit Shanghai Tower(632 meters), the highest building of China. You will have a panoramic view of the whole city with a 360 degrees dimension from the observatory. Then, relax yourself on the Huangpu River sightseeing cruise, and you will see amazing city landmarks alone the riverside, such as Oriental Pearl TV Tower, Shanghai World Financial Center Shanghai Tower, Shanghai Tower and colonial buildings of the Bund. It surely lights up your whole trip in Shanghai. If you have already visit some of those places above before, and want to do something different this time. Please feel free to pick below attraction or activities base on your interests. Maglev Train Experience Shanghai Jade Buddha temple Yuyuan garden and bazaar TV Tower/World financial center/Jinmao Tower Shanghai museum Shanghai Propaganda Poster Art Center If you select the tour with dinner option, you will enjoy a Sichuan style dinner after your day tour. Besides enjoy the Sichuan style food like steam pork, fried chicken or the famous Dandan noodle, you can watch the famous Face-Changing performance during your dinner time. After the tour, your guide will take you back to the hotel.