Two days at the Chengdu Panda Base is a struggle – you can’t quite see it all! I’ve already covered what I did see in the new expansion, and I’ve highlighted a few other key sightings at the base as well, but now time to focus on the ‘original’ part of the park. This entrance is now known as the South entrance, and is where I took a taxi to on both days (and also left from, I wasn’t really sure what the transport options were from the West gate). There are lots of barriers up to organise the crowds into a queue, I got there a little after opening and there was only a short queue to get in. The ticket desk is no longer manned, you need to buy your ticket online in advance – I couldn’t get payment to go through on the WeChat app (despite using WeChat pay for many other things), so I bought my ticket on the Trip.com app which was the same price (55RMB for an adult). All you need to do is select the date of the visit and if you want morning or afternoon entry. All you then need to enter is your passport/ID used for the booking which is very convenient.

On my way to see Yuan Meng in Panda House 1 the first panda I came across was Gong Zai – he was one of the few sitting out to eat and was ignoring his keepers calls to get him to come in, the bamboo was too appealing! He was sitting close to the front viewing area with a big pile of bamboo and I really enjoyed standing for ten-fifteen minutes watching him. It was very quiet at his enclosure, with maybe only ten people watching him so it was a very nice panda-viewing experience. I particularly loved his sign, I could definitely tell he had a strong physique and it’s fun to know that he was the prototype for Kung Fu Panda =D

You’ve seen Yuan Meng and the baby pandas at Chengdu Panda Base in September 2023, now lets see what else is brand new – and I’m talking about the huge extension that has been being built over the past few years and is now open. The expansion more than doubles the size of the panda base, and really makes the base a difficult place to cover everything in one day, you really need 2 full days to be able to see it all! I snapped a picture of the map at the South entrance when I arrived, but this map is named slightly differently to the version online. The in-person map has 4 areas marked to visit, but in the new map, the Sky Meadows Area is not included. I will have to see what this looks like now in May 2024.

When I visited in September 2023 the Star Forest Area/Panda Forest Area was closed, not sure if it was just not open or perhaps not yet finished – nevertheless, I wouldn’t have had time to visit anyway. I also didn’t make it to either the Sky Meadows Area of the Moon Valley Area/Panda Creek Valley Area which is right up at the new West entrance. So on my next trip I have 2 days at the base planned, and will start at the West entrance on 1 day so that I can see everything the new space has to offer. But for now, the Sun Hills Area/Panda Reception Hall, the Panda Pedestrian Street and the Bamboo Tower:

Here is the second post of my Chengdu Panda Base visits back in September 2023 – lets focus on those baby pandas! I have to say, having thought about it for a while now, with having only visited in November pre-Covid, I really was spoiled with adorable-aged baby pandas on every trip. Without fail I saw cuteness everyday I visited the base on those trips, and there were always multiple babies outside, playing together or with an enrichment item, or even with a keeper. I now realise September is not the time for that, the cubs are still too young to be left outside, with only one on show in each nursery at a time. The nurseries however are home to some of the previous years cubs, so they are there to see too. So I’ve come to the conclusion that November to May is probably prime cub-viewing time! In this window they will be old enough to be relatively mobile, and the temperatures aren’t so high that the pandas (all of them, not just the cubs) have to be kept inside. In the ‘old’ part of the base there are two nurseries to visit (Sunshine and Moonlight), there is one listed on the map in the ‘new’ area, however on my visit this particular section was closed. I visited both the Sunshine and Moonlight nurseries a number of times on this trip, and with the warm weather, it was particularly busy with visitors so there was sometimes a long queue for your 15 seconds to see the baby panda! I didn’t get a huge amount of pictures but I think there’s a couple of cute ones – and even better, I get to see these little cuties all grown up shortly after this post goes live, I can’t wait^

I never shared here, but did over on Instagram, but I was lucky enough to be able to go to China back in September 2023. The trip was for a conference in Beijing, but of course going all that way I added in several days of holiday to the trip and made my way to Chengdu for two days seeing pandas! I had two priorities for these visits to the Chengdu Panda Base and one of those was to see Yuan Meng. Yuan Meng was born at ZooParc de Beauval in 2017, I visited and saw him there in March 2022, and then in July 2023 he moved back to China to the Chengdu Panda Base. There wasn’t a huge amount of info online about him once he was there, but I was able to see that he was in Panda House 1 and was on show – that was enough for me and I endeavoured to head straight there on my visit. I got distracted by the nursery on the way there, but was able to get to Panda House 1 early enough that he was still outside. At the time of my visit there was no signage to identify what panda was in the enclosure, but there was a small group of photographers hanging around at one viewing spot in particular and I heard one of them say ‘Yuan Meng’ so I waited with them. At the base once the temperature gets to 26 degrees celcius (or above), the pandas are brought inside, it was getting pretty close to that when I got there, so I really was lucky to be able to see him at all (there was no indoor viewing for him). He was quite shy and very much stayed at the back of the outdoor space, so it could be a little tricky to get photos through the trees and bushes, but I quite like this as it gave him good options to be outside but without always being under the eyes of the public. Since my visit I’ve seen quite a few photos of him appearing on Chinese social media, so it looks like he’s gotten more confident and has been showing off for his fans!