Fifth part

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There were some things prior to Emei Shan that were left out, among them a visit to pandas and just too must trustfullness in Lonely Planet, so these must be told to see the whole picture clearer.

It has been a lifelong dream for me to see pandas. And what better place to see pandas than in China. So the day after arriving to Chengdu, we took a guided tour to the near panda breeding center. Here we made our first lonely planet mistake. According to the book it said that the easiest and best way of getting out there were by a hostel-arranged guided tour. The following should give you a good idea about why it is not a good idea to take a tour.

First of all, we were all crammed into a minivan, driving in 35 degrees and arrived soakingly bated in sweat. From the first moment it was clear that we were to follow the two chinese guides (by the way, we were 6 people and they didn't tell us anything, so the whole concept of guided tours pretty much lost its meaning there) even though the poster said two hours of free exploring. We saw the pandas, and got 45 minutes to walk around, which was quite nice, especially seeing the small, lazy pandas hanging in the trees (not litteraly, but you kan see the pictures). But after that the whole tour turned into bulls***. We got to see a movie about how incredibly great this breeding center was and afterwards we saw the pandamuseum, which coincidentally ended up in the giftshop, where we actually had to sit and wait for some 40 minutes. We later found out that it would've been cheaper and far better to just take a cap. (the price in this area is 1.4 yuan per km, which is about 15 cents) so even though we definitely saw pandas, and a whole lot of them, it was kinda annoying to go through all the rest.

The other Lonely Planet mistake we made was one night when we're out looking for a place to eat. This also gives a good idea about just how fast things are changing in China. But anyway, we found a hot pot restaurant in the book, and decided to go there. We took a cap, and the driver seemed to understand where we were going, but unfortunately we misunderstood him and were put off about a kilometer from the place, but that was okay. When we arrived there, all we could find was a building site. Our Lonely Planet is from 2005, so then again, two years had passed and it the place didn't seem too famouse or historical. Luckily we found a famous cafe in the book, about a kilometer from the hot pot restaurant. When we got there, not only was the cafe gone, there were a whole new hotel standing there. So we decided, after some heavy considerations involving macdonalds and kfc, to walk towards the third restaurant some 2 kilometers away, and would you believe it, they're were still there. So we bought our first and so far only steaks in china. We felt we deserved it, and walking 4 km kinda gives you a good appetite.

So from now on we only use Lonely Planet as a factfinder. Their advices pretty much suck.

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