Last week’s spring break holiday for my kid’s school finally gave us a chance to visit other parts of China after three years of being Beijing-bound. My family chose to make a trip to Chengdu, and I wanted to share our discovery of the city’s attractions and which ones were the most kid-friendly and worth your time.
Getting there: We chose to travel by train in a perhaps pointless act of being eco-friendly, and realized that train journeys are quite enjoyable, aside from the hardly-edible microwave meals. The kids had a really good time reading, playing and watching the scenery on the 7.5-hour ride. While I would say that 5 hours is probably the maximum I would prefer for a train trip, my kid said he would rather take the train than the plane if given the choice again!
Some general notes about Chengdu: The city is quite old and looks it. While the downtown Taikooli area is more modern, the rest of the city seemed to be in a state or disrepair and partial abandonment. Our hotel overlooked a large derelict stadium that looked like it was in the midst of being torn down, but we never heard nor saw the construction machines at work. That said, the age of the city gave it a rustic charm that added to its laid-back feel as we walked the wide pavements and often empty streets.
Food: The famous delicacy in the region is rabbit. Amidst the many stalls selling rabbit’s head and rabbit jerky, we read a morbid sign that said “No Rabbit Leaves Chengdu Alive”. Another bizarre souvenir is “dog poop candy” which is so named because of its brown color and texture but rest assured it’s made from nuts and sugar. Supposedly it gives you “dog poop luck” which is the opposite of what it sounds like.
Now let’s dive into Chengdu’s attractions themselves!
1. Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding
Within a 30-minute drive northeast of the city lies Chengdu’s biggest attraction – the Giant Panda Research Base. We set off at 7am on a work day, hoping to avoid the crowds by arriving right at opening time (7.30am) but were still beat by hundreds of panda-fanatics. There are bilingual tour services available for a small fee of RMB 100, but we didn’t see the need since there were signs in English at each enclosure. Considering the Base covers an area of 165 acres, you can easily spend an entire day there just exploring its many panda enclosures and natural sights – it also has lakes where you can observe different birds and other wildlife (squirrels). The park guide says it takes about 3 hours to walk and 1-2 hours by bus, but with kids and the jostling crowd, we barely made it past the lake in that time on foot. Fair warning: Our kids were all panda-ed out by the tenth panda enclosure and we left shortly after noon.
PRO TIPS: Bring your own snacks because they mostly sell ice cream, sweet drinks and rabbit/beef jerky at the snack booths around the park. Less crowded sit-down restaurants are mostly in the east of the park near the Swan Lake. The cleanest and least crowded toilet we found was also to the east of the park right across from the Panda Museum.
2. Tianfu Square, People’s Park, and Du Fu Thatched Cottage
Of these three popular attractions within Chengdu city, Du Fu Thatched Cottage would be our pick. The home of famous Chinese poet Du Fu, the sprawling grounds are more than just a walk in the park. With beautiful orchid and bonsai gardens, historical exhibits and statues, and even a museum with the original excavation findings, this park can be an entire afternoon event, especially if you pack a picnic basket to enjoy at one of the many gazebos within.
Tianfu Spare and People’s Park are within walking distance of each other and worth a quick look if you like huge statues of Mao and monuments to soldiers and trains. Warning: The “Kids playground” in People’s Park is a mini amusement park featuring carnival-esque rides like bumper cars and merry-go-rounds.
3. Wide Narrow Alley and Jinli Old Street
Both of these attractions are touted as “charming authentic shopping alleys” and are almost always overrun by tourists. Still, Jinli Old Street was more authentic and interesting to us – with its location being right next to Wuhou Monastery and in the Tibetan quarter of the city, which offers entire streets of giant Buddhas and Tibetan restaurants, as well as a variety of shops. We saw all manner of shops selling everything from hand-embroidered panda T-shirts to fungus to hand-carved donkey-skin shadow puppets. This was also where we finally decided to catch another Chengdu special – the face-changing opera. Even though what we watched was a watered-down 15 minute version of this usually hour-long performance, it was definitely one of the highlights of our Chengdu visit! Not only the kids, but even us adults were quite baffled as to how the performer changed the masks in an instant, like magic.
4. Qingchengshan World heritage Site
We climbed a mountain! There was a mini-bus, a gondola, and a ferry involved, but by golly we did it! The kids climbed over 10,000 vertical steps to one of the 300 peaks of Qingchengshan – we reached over 1000m above sea level! But the best part? We didn’t even break a sweat because of Chengdu’s incredible climate. From our local driver we learned that Chengdu is hailed as “paradise on Earth,” and that if celestial beings were to come down from heaven, they would visit Chengdu. I can believe it – the temperature stays between 15 and 25 degrees for most of the year, and it rains just enough for it to be humid without you feeling it.
PRO TIP: The ticket office will offer you a map which, while very pretty, is practically useless. Once you get off the gondola further up the mountain, follow the steps to weave through several temples before you get to the highest one. The peak we reached is not a true peak that offers you a towering view. In fact, since you’re above the clouds, you probably won’t see anything (We didn’t). But we had the satisfaction of knowing we climbed all the way!
The last ferry and shuttle bus end their services by 6pm so make sure you are well on your way down before then! The shops along the way also close around 5.30pm, so if you want to buy any overpriced souvenirs, make sure you do so before then!
Images: Vivienne Tseng-Rush, Shu Qi
