Sichuan Travel Reviews

Because the bad weather and subsequent blocking of the roads had stopped me from going to Jiuzhaigou (see first installment of this story) I decided to stay in the city of Guangyuan, Sichuan (广元，四川) for a couple of days to discover what kinds of sights this place had ... Details

Tanke is a dry, dusty, dirty service town for the surrounding grasslands. A police car sits in the middle of the intersection overseeing the small amount of traffic that floods the town during holidays and we ask them for advice about transport out of town. We are only going a few more kilometers ... Details

It had been in my agenda for months. On October 2nd I would meet my good friend in Sichuan's famous nature park Jiuzhaigou (九寨沟) Due to the huge tourist crowds everywhere, the October holiday is of course not the best time to visit a well-known place like that, but since I am a ... Details

Our National Day Holiday was coming to an end. We’d spent several days in the remote and beautiful Suomo valley, at Zhuokeji, the home of the Zang minority of Tibetans. It had been one of the best short holidays I have ever taken and our final day had been spent relaxing in Chengdu enjoying some ... Details

A fragrance, only slightly familiar, wafts on the air. It is several hours later that it hits me. The smell, while not offensive issues from the other passengers, from their clothes, their bodies, their belongings – it’s the fragrance of their lifestyle - of living and working on the grasslands. ... Details

The air is crisp and cold as we step off the plane. It has been a short one-hour flight and as we made our final decent we flew low over mountains with a dusting of snow, like icing on a bun loaf, the last vestiges of winter before the landscape blooms again in spring. I have my fleecy jacket on ... Details

"Obsessive-Compulsive Traveller " is almost an oxymoron, (because frankly, if your afraid of getting a bit dirty or don't cope with the unexpected, what are you doing travelling anyway?)and travelling through outback China certainly is not for the 'Felix Ungers' of this world.(Reference to ... Details

One of the delights in travelling in China for we foreigners, is the unexpected delights around every corner. The following story is an insight to the humour that accompanied our group on our last trip to the Kangba region of the Sichuan Provence.
The toliets:
We in the west have become so 'sanitised' ... Details

If you've been reading my Beautful Kangba journey, we were in the town daofu and travelled onto Tagong temple(called little Lhasa). The temple houses a buddhist statue donated by the Chinese Emporer's daughter that is more than 300years old, and covered in gold leaf. It is said that the Emporer sent ... Details

Lying at the foot of the Minshan Mountains, in the northern reaches of Sichuan, is the quaint and well-preserved historic town of Songpan. Seen mostly as a stop over on the route between Chengdu and Jiuzhaigou, or as a base for horse trekking, Songpan has more to offer the traveler than initially meets ... Details