So I'm a little late getting up but Fei Fei is still here so we go for some breakfast across the road, I have bowser. Luckily I narrowly miss a run in with some crazy girl who had shown more than a passing interest with me the night before. Then Fei Fei has asked about the buses so she knows the score, I just tag along. A short walk and we are ready to take our bus. The usual mayhem on the roads and as we are stopped at some lights I get to witness my first road accident. This bike smashes straight in to the back of a stationary bike. The stopped bike had two people in it and they jolt forward, the bloke that ran in to them goes flying forward an lands on his face a short distance in front. Looked painful. The bloke peels himself off the road and looks suitably shocked, no one seems angry, they are just talking as my bus drives off. Of course no one is wearing any helmets. Madness, could have been much worse.
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Our bus arrives at the station. Complete bedlam! Cars and buses an people everywhere. Fei Fei asks where we are to get our next bus from. The general consensus is that we get it from across the road, we wait until the next bus comes along, it is packed, no way we are getting on that. I'm getting concerned about the amount of time we are waiting, so Fei Fei calls a taxi, 20 yuan each to get to the pandas, we are happy to pay so we jump in. Round the corner and straight in to a jam. 6 lanes in to 1, no organisation, cars pushing up the side, everyone nudging forward small amounts. Complete chaos. It takes us half an hour to travel 50m, once we get clear of the madness it is plain sailing to the pandas. Doesn't take us long at all. Another frenzy waits for us once we arrive, vehicles and people everywhere with no sign of any order, until we try to pay for our entry. Then we are signalled off to the right, through an arch and a good 60m down the path to the end I the queue. Damn national day!! The queue is pretty fast moving so it is not too long until we have our tickets and are in the park. We are getting the little shuttle bus up to the top of the park and then we will work our way down. It's a great day, a nice breeze and cloudy, Fei Fei of course is cold, I tell her this is like a summers day back at home. We walk to the first enclosure and I'm surprised to see a panda, straight out of the blocks. He is also awake and just munching at some bamboo. A bunch of noisy Chinese surround the best photo spots, to be expected. After a short wait I manage to get a couple of shots, the serenity is shattered by the familiar noise of a Chinese person hawking up! I turn round, it's a girl no older than 3. Nice. They teach them early all right!
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We wander through the park checking out the various enclosures, and we get to see a lot of pandas. Which is a welcome surprise as I didn't think we would have seen so many, also a lot of them were active, and I thought they would all have been sleeping. We come across a mother and cub, messing around together, pretty awesome. To my delight they also have a red panda enclosure, my favourite. When we get there they are nowhere to be seen, then suddenly one appears, Chinese people come running and kids screaming. No sooner had the panda appeared than it was running away back in to the bamboo, probably scared for its life. I'm pretty angry that I didn't really get to see because of the crazy Chinese. I wait for a short while and then panda comes back out. This time everyone keeps quiet and we get a good chance to look at it. Later on there is even a red panda walking along the path, incredible how tame it was around humans. We also got to go to the panda nursery, where we got to see some baby pandas in an incubator. Though it was a rushed affair with a constantly moving queue policy in place, very little time to see or take a photo. After quite a bit of walking we get back down to the start of the park and then we decide to bus it back. 3 buses and ¥3 later we are back in Chengdu.
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Stomachs are rumbling as we only had a snack in the panda park due to the prices. So we go to Jinli Street, which is another famous old street in Chengdu. Rammed with Chinese, busy, busy, busy. Lots of places to eat here and Fei Fei has me trying all sorts! Rabbit head, apparently a local delicacy, spicy pea cake, sweet rice wine stuff, sweet rice from a pineapple, fish and some tofu thing. I get to wait at the side while Fei Fei disappears in to the crowd and then comes back later with two dishes of god knows what! Again, it is the usual wrestle with trying to pay. Apparently because I am the guest I don't have to pay, then when these people come to my country I can return the favour. It is quite the generous move especially as everyone I have met has only known me for a few days. Let's hope they all don't come back to see me at once, or I'll be broke. After quite the bit of sampling and wrestling our way through the crowds we get to the end of the street and all that is left is to fight our way back. I have been looking for a bracelet in China, one to add to my collection and we had seen a few as we were walking the streets. None at a good price. One had caught my eye earlier and on the way back Fei Fei went alone to try and get it, fearing my presence was driving the price up. She managed to get it at less than half the price I was being quoted. The advantages of having a Chinese speaker with you. Back to the hostel!
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Few beers with Fei Fei and Jimmy and a couple of other Chinese guys in the hostel, and of course some pool as it is my final night! On to Guilin tomorrow, I hope I have made the right decision for national week, it's a bit late now though, I go tomorrow. Fingers crossed!