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Use the form below to email this page to a friend.The Wild Side of China Photo Adventure - NEW TRIP!
Photograph Giant Pandas, Serene Landscapes and Abundant Wildlife in Remote Reserves
Day 1: Beijing, China
Arrive in Beijing and transfer to our hotel. After lunch together, we visit the Forbidden City, seat of imperial power from the 15th century till 1924. Then, we'll stop at the Cha Jia Fu teahouse where we'll have a slide show presentation on China's natural history and photography opportunties as we enjoy authentic Chinese tea and snacks. Afterward, guests are free to walk through the Houhai Hutong area along Shi Cha Lake, for a glimpse of daily life in a traditional old Beijing neighborhood. This evening we enjoy a welcome dinner at a special restaurant.
Day 2: Beijing / Great Wall
Rise early to visit a more remote section of the Great Wall, the 2,000-year-old edifice built to protect Chinese civilization from encroaching northern tribes. This afternoon we tour the narrow lanes of Old Beijing by pedicab, photographing scenes of traditional life in the 500-year-old Hutong neighborhoods. Tonight, enjoy a classic Peking duck dinner and optional Kung Fu dance performance.
Day 3: Chengdu
Fly to Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province, famous for its silk brocade, piquant cuisine and giant pandas. First we visit the Moon Bear Rescue Center, part of an international effort to protect highly endangered Asiatic black bears. Later, we'll stroll through Bamboo Park on the banks of the Brocade River, where locals dance, play chess and drink tea. Harboring 150 species of bamboo, these gardens shelter a nesting rookery for night herons and egrets. Practice photographing fast-moving egrets in flight as they commute up and down the river in front of us. After a Sichuan-style dinner featuring regional specialties, a Chinese opera and “face-changing” show is an option for evening entertainment.
Day 4: Chengdu Panda Base / Bifengxia Panda Base
Few experiences offer more delight for the wildlife lover than today’s close-up interactions with China’s famed giant pandas. First we visit Chengdu’s Giant Panda Breeding Research Base, home to more than 100 pandas, where we’ll learn about the pandas’ habitat, diet, mating habits and how they have survived despite increasing threats to their existence. We then drive to mountainous Ya’an where we’ll spend the afternoon at Bifengxia Panda Base. This base offers excellent opportunities to photograph pandas in a natural setting of lush bamboo thickets. Tonight our Expedition Leader will share a slideshow lecture on panda biology.
Day 5: Bifengxia / Shangli / Chengdu
Return to Bifengxia this morning for another chance to interact with the pandas, including cubs! Then, we ride down a 26-story elevator to the bottom of Bifeng Gorge for a leisurely short hike amidst the stream, waterfalls and abundant plant and bird life. We’ll practice techniques for photographing waterfalls, and low-light forest landscapes. After lunch in the ancient village of Shangli, we head back to Chengdu, enjoying another Sichuan feast tonight in the 2,000-year-old Jinli neighborhood. After dark, we stroll the narrow lanes of old Chengdu to enjoy its traditional ambience, photographing street scenes and people.
Days 6-8: Wild Panda Nature Reserve
Drive north into the Minshan Mountains, stopping for lunch in a Gansu Muslim village. We wander through the ancient neighborhood and local market, capturing timeless images of rural Chinese life, and visit a school to meet the local children. Beyond lies a secret slice of Chinese wilderness, a chain of nature reserves little known to outsiders and visited by only a handful of westerners. Our focus is a remote 100,000-acre sanctuary encompassing a lushly forested ecosystem that’s among the most diverse and intact in Asia. This national reserve, rated Grade I by WWF as a global biodiversity hotspot, is home to healthy populations of some of the world's most endangered wildlife, including some 60 giant pandas. The reserve also harbors more than 1,200 takin and 1,000 golden monkeys among its 430 different mammal species, as well as more than 2,400 different kinds of plants.
We’ll photograph wildlife on morning and evening excursions, making use of optimal light conditions. Our hope, of course, is to spy the elusive giant panda in the wild: this is prime habitat for pandas and moon bears, and our exclusive permits allow us into the core areas of the reserve where they freely live and breed. We may also see Tibetan and Rhesus macaques, golden and Sichuan takin, musk deer, muntjac, serow, wild boar, blue sheep and red panda. Bird watching opportunities are superb, with more than 150 species in the reserve, including the elegant golden pheasant. Night drives and walks may reveal nocturnal creatures such as leopard cats, civets and hog-nosed badgers. Many of the animals lack a fear of humans due to nearly a half-century of protection from hunting, and can be photographed from the many roads and trails we will explore.
Day 9: Wild Panda Reserve / Jiuzhaigou
After one last optional early-morning walk to view and photograph wildlife, we depart the reserve. As we leave the park we stop to visit with a local farmer who was a former subsistence hunter in these forests. Since the creation of the reserve, he now uses his skills to guide researchers and visitors on expeditions into the mountains. On a tour of his farm, we’ll see and learn about a biowaste project that uses agricultural by-products to create methane for cooking fuel, reducing consumption of local wood. Continuing overland on a stunning drive through the mountains, we crest Rhododendron Pass en route to the Tibetan Plateau and Jiuzhaigou National Park, stopping periodically to photograph the rugged landscape.
Day 10: Jiuzhaigou National Park
Spend the day photographing the natural beauty of Jiuzhiagou National Park, a UN Biosphere Reserve. Birdwatching is outstanding on easy hikes through an idyllic backdrop of peaks, ravines, forest, meadows, wildflowers and a multitude of lakes and waterfalls. Tibetan culture is dominant here, evidenced by the prayer wheels and chortens that dot the landscape. This is one of the greatest places on earth to photograph waterfalls, and we’ll practice long exposure techniques to capture the motion of the water during a day devoted to capturing great landscape shots.
Day 11: Golden Monkey Reserve / Jiuzhaigou
This morning we visit a reserve that protects 1,600 golden snub-nosed monkeys. Highly endangered, this endemic species lives in the thick Sichuan forests at altitudes between 5,000 and 10,000 feet, spending most of its time in the canopy. Snow blankets these mixed woodlands for several months a year, though golden monkeys are well suited to tolerate the severe winters, enduring the coldest temperatures of any non-human primate in the world. Long holding a special place in Chinese culture, the golden monkey is considered a ‘state treasure’ much as the giant panda is. This afternoon we stop at an authentic Tibetan village and learn more about life and customs within this deeply traditional culture.
Day 12: Chengdu
Fly back to Chengdu in time for a late lunch. After checking in our hotel, join an optional walking excursion through a pedestrian neighborhood to get some final shots, do some last-minute shopping, or indulge in a traditional Asian massage at our hotel’s elegant new Chi Spa. Our grand adventure comes to a close this evening with a farewell dinner at one of China’s most spectacularly located dining venues: a restaurant built on a footbridge spanning the Brocade River, with egrets flying beneath.
Day 13: Depart
Transfer to the airport today for flights home.
Arrive in Beijing and transfer to our hotel. After lunch together, we visit the Forbidden City, seat of imperial power from the 15th century till 1924. Then, we'll stop at the Cha Jia Fu teahouse where we'll have a slide show presentation on China's natural history and photography opportunties as we enjoy authentic Chinese tea and snacks. Afterward, guests are free to walk through the Houhai Hutong area along Shi Cha Lake, for a glimpse of daily life in a traditional old Beijing neighborhood. This evening we enjoy a welcome dinner at a special restaurant.
Day 2: Beijing / Great Wall
Rise early to visit a more remote section of the Great Wall, the 2,000-year-old edifice built to protect Chinese civilization from encroaching northern tribes. This afternoon we tour the narrow lanes of Old Beijing by pedicab, photographing scenes of traditional life in the 500-year-old Hutong neighborhoods. Tonight, enjoy a classic Peking duck dinner and optional Kung Fu dance performance.
Day 3: Chengdu
Fly to Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province, famous for its silk brocade, piquant cuisine and giant pandas. First we visit the Moon Bear Rescue Center, part of an international effort to protect highly endangered Asiatic black bears. Later, we'll stroll through Bamboo Park on the banks of the Brocade River, where locals dance, play chess and drink tea. Harboring 150 species of bamboo, these gardens shelter a nesting rookery for night herons and egrets. Practice photographing fast-moving egrets in flight as they commute up and down the river in front of us. After a Sichuan-style dinner featuring regional specialties, a Chinese opera and “face-changing” show is an option for evening entertainment.
Day 4: Chengdu Panda Base / Bifengxia Panda Base
Few experiences offer more delight for the wildlife lover than today’s close-up interactions with China’s famed giant pandas. First we visit Chengdu’s Giant Panda Breeding Research Base, home to more than 100 pandas, where we’ll learn about the pandas’ habitat, diet, mating habits and how they have survived despite increasing threats to their existence. We then drive to mountainous Ya’an where we’ll spend the afternoon at Bifengxia Panda Base. This base offers excellent opportunities to photograph pandas in a natural setting of lush bamboo thickets. Tonight our Expedition Leader will share a slideshow lecture on panda biology.
Day 5: Bifengxia / Shangli / Chengdu
Return to Bifengxia this morning for another chance to interact with the pandas, including cubs! Then, we ride down a 26-story elevator to the bottom of Bifeng Gorge for a leisurely short hike amidst the stream, waterfalls and abundant plant and bird life. We’ll practice techniques for photographing waterfalls, and low-light forest landscapes. After lunch in the ancient village of Shangli, we head back to Chengdu, enjoying another Sichuan feast tonight in the 2,000-year-old Jinli neighborhood. After dark, we stroll the narrow lanes of old Chengdu to enjoy its traditional ambience, photographing street scenes and people.
Days 6-8: Wild Panda Nature Reserve
Drive north into the Minshan Mountains, stopping for lunch in a Gansu Muslim village. We wander through the ancient neighborhood and local market, capturing timeless images of rural Chinese life, and visit a school to meet the local children. Beyond lies a secret slice of Chinese wilderness, a chain of nature reserves little known to outsiders and visited by only a handful of westerners. Our focus is a remote 100,000-acre sanctuary encompassing a lushly forested ecosystem that’s among the most diverse and intact in Asia. This national reserve, rated Grade I by WWF as a global biodiversity hotspot, is home to healthy populations of some of the world's most endangered wildlife, including some 60 giant pandas. The reserve also harbors more than 1,200 takin and 1,000 golden monkeys among its 430 different mammal species, as well as more than 2,400 different kinds of plants.
We’ll photograph wildlife on morning and evening excursions, making use of optimal light conditions. Our hope, of course, is to spy the elusive giant panda in the wild: this is prime habitat for pandas and moon bears, and our exclusive permits allow us into the core areas of the reserve where they freely live and breed. We may also see Tibetan and Rhesus macaques, golden and Sichuan takin, musk deer, muntjac, serow, wild boar, blue sheep and red panda. Bird watching opportunities are superb, with more than 150 species in the reserve, including the elegant golden pheasant. Night drives and walks may reveal nocturnal creatures such as leopard cats, civets and hog-nosed badgers. Many of the animals lack a fear of humans due to nearly a half-century of protection from hunting, and can be photographed from the many roads and trails we will explore.
Day 9: Wild Panda Reserve / Jiuzhaigou
After one last optional early-morning walk to view and photograph wildlife, we depart the reserve. As we leave the park we stop to visit with a local farmer who was a former subsistence hunter in these forests. Since the creation of the reserve, he now uses his skills to guide researchers and visitors on expeditions into the mountains. On a tour of his farm, we’ll see and learn about a biowaste project that uses agricultural by-products to create methane for cooking fuel, reducing consumption of local wood. Continuing overland on a stunning drive through the mountains, we crest Rhododendron Pass en route to the Tibetan Plateau and Jiuzhaigou National Park, stopping periodically to photograph the rugged landscape.
Day 10: Jiuzhaigou National Park
Spend the day photographing the natural beauty of Jiuzhiagou National Park, a UN Biosphere Reserve. Birdwatching is outstanding on easy hikes through an idyllic backdrop of peaks, ravines, forest, meadows, wildflowers and a multitude of lakes and waterfalls. Tibetan culture is dominant here, evidenced by the prayer wheels and chortens that dot the landscape. This is one of the greatest places on earth to photograph waterfalls, and we’ll practice long exposure techniques to capture the motion of the water during a day devoted to capturing great landscape shots.
Day 11: Golden Monkey Reserve / Jiuzhaigou
This morning we visit a reserve that protects 1,600 golden snub-nosed monkeys. Highly endangered, this endemic species lives in the thick Sichuan forests at altitudes between 5,000 and 10,000 feet, spending most of its time in the canopy. Snow blankets these mixed woodlands for several months a year, though golden monkeys are well suited to tolerate the severe winters, enduring the coldest temperatures of any non-human primate in the world. Long holding a special place in Chinese culture, the golden monkey is considered a ‘state treasure’ much as the giant panda is. This afternoon we stop at an authentic Tibetan village and learn more about life and customs within this deeply traditional culture.
Day 12: Chengdu
Fly back to Chengdu in time for a late lunch. After checking in our hotel, join an optional walking excursion through a pedestrian neighborhood to get some final shots, do some last-minute shopping, or indulge in a traditional Asian massage at our hotel’s elegant new Chi Spa. Our grand adventure comes to a close this evening with a farewell dinner at one of China’s most spectacularly located dining venues: a restaurant built on a footbridge spanning the Brocade River, with egrets flying beneath.
Day 13: Depart
Transfer to the airport today for flights home.
Every 1st & 3rd Tuesday of the month, starting on February 5th! 
Eric Rock
Studies suggest that two-thirds of the world’s polar bear population could be gone by 2050. And if current warming trends continue unabated, WWF scientists and other researchers believe that polar bears may disappear altogether within 100 years. WWF is intent on preventing this from happening. 
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