JZ17 Jiuzhaigou+Chengdu Ya’an Bifengxia Panda Base 6 Days Tour

Duration: 6 days
Attraction: World Heritage Sichuan Highlights Sightseeing, Jiuzhaigou National Park and Huanglong National Park Bifengxia Panda Base and Giant Panda Bears Research Center
Route: Chengdu – Huanglong – Jiuzhaigou – Chengdu – Shangli old town – Bifengxia Panda Base – Huanglongxi old town – Chengdu airport.

Brief Description
The World Heritage Forest Programme Stretching over 72,000 ha in the northern part of Sichuan Province, the jagged Jiuzhaigou valley reaches a height of more than 4,800 m, thus comprising a series of diverse forest ecosystems. Its superb landscapes are particularly interesting for their series of narrow conic karst land forms and spectacular waterfalls. Some 140 bird species also inhabit the valley, as well as a number of endangered plant and animal species, including the giant panda and the Sichuan takin.

Called Dzitsa Degu in Tibetan, Jiuzhai Valley or Jiuzhaigou National Park is located in the Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Sichuan Province, South Western China. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1992 and it belongs to the category 5 in the IUCN system of protected area categorization. Jiuzhai Valley literally means “Nine Village Valley” and is named after the nine Tibetan villages scattered throughout the park. There is evidence of people living in the national park up to 3,000 years and the local people still hold onto many of their traditional ways of life. The human population of the park is just over 1,000 which comprises of over 110 families.

The superb landscapes of Jiuzhai Valley are particularly interesting for their narrow conic karst land forms and spectacular waterfalls and lakes. There are over 220 bird species found in Jiuzhai Valley as well as a number of endangered plant and animal species, including the giant panda, Sichuan golden monkey and the Sichuan takin.

Jiuzhai Valley is part of the Min Shan mountain range on the edge of the Tibetan Himalayan Pletau and stretches over 720 sq km (72,000 hectares) with an extra buffer zone of 598 sq. km (60,000 hectares). The Min Mountains are one of South West China’s most important biodiversity typezones. The elevation of the national park ranges from almost 2,000m (6,500 feet) at the entrance to over 4,500m (14,760 feet) on the mountain peaks and the series of forest ecosystems are stratified by elevation.

As a tourist resort it boasts 114 lakes lying downward in an echelon manner, on which are 17 waterfalls, 47 springs, 17 splashing waterfalls, 11 turbulent streams and 5 travertine beaches and 9 Tibetan villages, formulating alpine lake clusters and travertine spots that are rarely seen in China and even in the world. All these scenic sights, set against the backdrop of 92 snowy peaks, create a unqiue natural landscape of high mountains and deep gullies in Jiuzhaigou.

The water, the soul of Jiuzhaigou, is so cystal clear and rich in colors that it has earned the reputation, so well expressed in the saying “Those who have visited Jiuzhaigou will no longer appreciate the water landscape again”, Varying in size and shapes, sparkling with colors in brilliant sunlight, the more than 100 lakes define the waterscapes and form their essence. The unique tourist culture of Jiuzhaigou is captured by the purity of the green water, the reflections in the lakes, the stone mills, the Tibetan villages, the Buddhist sutra-streamers and the folk songs and dances of the Tibetan and the Qiang people. With its 30,000 hectares of virgin forests, Jiuzhaigou is also a botanical and zoological paradise, a habitat of dense conifers and broadleaf trees for such rare and endangered animals as the Giant Panda, the Golden Snub-Nosed Monkey, and the White-Lipped Deer.