Nigel: With a quick stop over in Xining, we headed on an overnight train down to Chengdu. The train journey was another long one, 24 hours, and we arrived in to the city late afternoon. The main reason for the stop, other than breaking the journey up, was to see the giant pandas which the city is famous for. To get to the panda sanctuary, you have to take two buses and it took about 1 hr to get there. Depending on when you get there, will depend on whether you will see the pandas, as once they had fed themselves they would usually go and rest undercover. We had read that the best viewing time was early morning or late afternoon, when feeding time took place. With an early alarm wake up and our eyes half shut, we set off on the bus. With the exception of missing our first stop, the journey went smoothly. The sanctuary is set within a large wooded area and there are several sections in which you can visit. As soon as we arrived in the park we headed to where the main feeding area was and got there just in time. As some had taken the bus (we decided to walk) there was already a mass gathering of people, so getting to the front was a little difficult. We arrived just in time as not long after the feeding, most of the other sections were deserted. We also visited the incubation centre, which cares for newly born pandas until they are capable to be let out into the wild.... fenced area.

During our time here, we also visited the cinema. We weren't really going to go but we got talking to one of the hostel workers and he was keen to take us. We thought it's not everyday you go out with the locals, so we set off to watch Liam Neeson's latest movie. The film was good viewing but the only down side was that during most of the film text messages were sent/received as part of the plot. Theses messages are normally in English but as we were in China they were in Chinese. So throughout most of the film we had our hostel friend translating the text messages to me and then I was then translating them to Alison. The only problem being, in parts it would go so quick, I wouldn't have time to translate to Alison or if I did, what I got told her was changed. Apart from that it was a good evening and we enjoyed the experience.