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Chengdu - Never Heard of It...
Amongst our "Bottom 3" bus journeys was the the bus from Chongqing to Chengdu. 7 hours spent in seats for midgets with absolutely no legroom was not our idea of fun. However, this aside, Chengdu, that well known Chinese city of 5 million people rocked. We checked into our next hotel and spent the day exploring the city with it's countless rickshaws, restaurants and flourescently lit bridges. Chengdu is a modern day Chinese city with lots of old day culture. The 100 foot Mao statue which pays homage to the PRC's "Father" is pretty impressive, particularly when it is covered in bamboo scaffolding!
Early start again and another 3 hour bus journey to see the worlds biggest Buddah. Carved over a 90 year period by Buddhist Monks some 1400 years ago and sitting at 200-300 feet tall, three people could eat their lunch on his big toe. This Buddah was big and so was the cue to see him. We descended down his left side, along with hundreds of other tourists. The Chinese people's ability to push and shove and jump cues amazes you. As a result, you step back and let them
go first. But when you have a foot either side of you and a local Chinese grandma is doing her best to get past you and down the 2 in 1 gradient steps, you need some devine intervention - and luckily enough you don't have to look very far to see Buddah, telling you not to send this lovely little grandma rapidly down the steps to join him sooner than she may have anticipated! The highlight of the journey back was our female bus conductor bellowing for 30 minutes down her mobile at her staff. She was a "Lady" I can assure you.
Day 2 and the highlight of the tour so far - The Giant Panda's. Amazing creatures, beautiful to look at, awesome to watch. There are around 2000 Giant Panda's left in the world and if you are caught poaching these boys then you are awarded the death penalty for your troubles. Rest assured, these are classed as a "National Treasure", along with the Fobidden City and the Great Wall of China and quite rightly so, they were beautiul and for the princely sum of $A220 you can have your picture taken with one. Not to rip
you off, but to deter people from having their picture taken with them - Smart move I think! Of course, I arranged for YT to have her picture taken with a Panda (of the stuffed toy variety instead)!
We spent an afternoon in a Tea House enjoying a Chinese massage - Nice work if you can get it and enjoyed the People's Park where you will find the locals dancing to PDiddy (not quite). Of course YT had a dance and I duly obliged (with some encouragement) as a man loves dancing at the best of times! We spent the evening at a Chinese Opera which was wicked, too much detail to bore you with but well worth the $.
So our view of Chengdu as we headed to our next sleeper train - 17 hour sleeper train to Xian and the Terracotta Warriors was awesome. Put it on your list of places to see if you are in these parts!
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cute...
Yeah they are pretty cute... but when they can go off http://www.jokaroo.com/extremevideos/pandaattack.html :)