Now onto the final area of the Ya’an Bifengxia Base, the Panda Kindergarten and Breeding Station! This area is between the smaller size of the White Bear Ground and the larger Overseas Panda Paradise and is a pretty good mid-point to a visit as it has toilets and a shop building where you can choose from a huge range of souvenirs but also pick up some small snacks (hello first panda ice cream of the trip!). Here there 4 large enclosures, 2 in each of 2 areas which are on either side of the main ‘square’ here. On each side you have a mother panda with cubs, then the other enclosure on each side had subadult twins. This is the perfect place to see pandas interacting together at all young ages – on my visit there were cubs born in 2021, 2022 and 2023 so you’re seeing all ages of young ones. Of course, the youngest of those were the most popular and you can see more about them in my next post. But first, see some of the other pandas:

The final panda to share about at the Overseas Panda Paradise, Gang Beng Er (钢镚儿)! The pinyin doesn’t translate well to English for him, but Gang Beng Er is such a handsome panda, he’s really so cute^ So many good pictures of him, such a photogenic boy =D He is neighbour to Xiang Xiang, and similarly his enclosure is viewed through a couple of glass windows – despite this, I didn’t have issues photographing through this glass at all, so the angle must have been just right to avoid the sun. He was out both in the morning and afternoon when I went to see him and his enclosure did seem to have a good amount of shade throughout the day. His enclosure is on a hillside, the viewing windows are on a slope near the top where his indoor space is and there is a flat concrete round with a water fountain flowing down – this is where his food was put out for him and is in perfect spot for viewing. Then the enclosure slopes down and stretches back quite far, with plenty of trees and foliage. There was a lot of space that he could definitely use that isn’t in too direct and eye of the public, which is nice for the panda.

On to the penultimate panda to share about at the Overseas Panda Paradise, and by far the most popular panda of the day, it’s Xiang Xiang (香香)! Xiang Xiang is now 7 years old and she is a returned panda from Japan, having been born in Toyko’s Ueno Zoo. Her travel to China was delayed due to travel restrictions, so she eventually made her way there in February 2023, so has been living in China for over a year now. She’s a big favourite not only with the Chinese visitors, but there were several Japanese visitors at the base too to specifically see her. We didn’t see her out in the morning, but when we returned around 1:45PM ready to see her at her 2PM bamboo time, there was a small crowd of visitors already waiting for her. The keepers put out a big pile of bamboo, shoots, an apple and some panda cake – apparently she’s not a big fan of the cake because the apple was first choice followed by the shoots, only then did she eat the cake!

For me, this enclosure isn’t the best in terms of viewing options for the public – all the viewing of her is through glass, and there are 3 windows to choose from. One is more at the side of the hill in her enclosure, so not so easy a place to see her, the other two are at the flat concrete area which was where the keepers strategically placed her food so she would sit in perfect view. The enclosure was quite hilly overall, and there was a bit of a dip in the terrain behind the concrete platform, so many places where she can sit out and not be in the view of anyone – this gives her good options, but not so much for the public. I’m just really pleased we were at the right place at the right time for the afternoon feeding, I think I got some great photos of this cutie^

Next up in the Overseas Panda Paradise, it’s Fan Xing (梵星)! Fan Xing was born in The Netherlands at Ouwehands Dierenpark in 2020, to mum Wu Wen and dad Xing Ya. Because of the ongoing travel restrictions, I didn’t get to see her there. She then moved to China in September 2023, and now stays in the Ya’an Bifengxia Base. Her neighbours there are Bei Bei on one side, and Yun Duo and her young cubs on the other – good company I’d think, and I’ve seen pictures of her up trees and looking over into Yun Duo‘s yard, which is adorable^ Friends were visiting the day before I was and so I heard she had been quite active and near the front of the enclosure that day, that must have used her energy up because on my visit she was mostly to the back of the enclosure and sleeping! I got lucky and saw her up and moving around a little later in the afternoon, but that was only after waiting a long time – but it was worth it – she’s such a cutie =D While at this enclosure we also met a Dutch couple who were also on holiday to specifically see the pandas, it’s lovely to see other people also doing panda-filled holidays like me!

The photos I got certainly aren’t the best, she was really at the reach of my camera lens and was through several trees and bushes, but I still am happy with them.