Handpicked experience · Chengdu
Chengdu, China
A poet's roof blew off here and he wished for a mansion to shelter the world's poor — and the temple next door is named for a minister, not the emperor buried in it.
Chengdu Panda Base covers an area of 165 acres and takes about 3 hours to explore fully.
Dufu's Thatched Cottage is both a park and a museum that echoes solemnity, simplicity, elegance, and grace.
The current Wuhou Temple was rebuilt in 1672 and is surrounded by old cypresses and classical red walls.
A morning spent on the unglamorous side of conservation
The ground where a fifth of a great poet's work was written
A tomb inside a temple named for somebody else
A private guide across three very different sites
A day that pairs animals with the city's literary history
A full day from Chengdu: a supervised volunteer session at the Dujiangyan panda centre in the morning, lunch in the city, and the afternoon at Du Fu's Thatched Cottage and Wuhou Temple, with a private guide and driver throughout.
Du Fu is generally ranked among the greatest poets in the Chinese language, and he wrote roughly a fifth of his surviving work in a hut on this spot. He arrived in 759 as a refugee from the An Lushan Rebellion, poor and out of favour, and stayed about four years.
One autumn the wind stripped the thatch off his roof and local boys carried it away while he shouted after them. He wrote the incident down, and the poem does not end where you expect. Having described the rain coming through, the cold and his children's torn bedding, he turns outward and wishes for a vast mansion to shelter every poor scholar in the world — saying he would die content in his broken hut if such a building existed.
The thatched cottage you visit is a reconstruction; the site is not. Standing in the garden, the poem is about the roof above your head.
Wuhou Temple is named for Zhuge Liang, the chancellor of the Shu Han kingdom, whose posthumous title was Marquis Wu. But the tomb inside the grounds belongs to Liu Bei — the emperor Zhuge Liang served.
Both shrines existed separately and were eventually merged, and the popular name that stuck was the minister's rather than the monarch's. Chinese visitors notice this immediately: a temple containing an emperor's tomb, universally called by the name of his advisor, because the advisor is the one the country decided to love.
The volunteer session is work. It typically means weighing and preparing bamboo and panda cake, recording animal behaviour on a chart, and cleaning enclosures — which is the polite phrase for shovelling.
There is no cuddling, and contact is limited or absent depending on the rules in force that day. If you come expecting to hold an animal you will be disappointed; if you come to spend a morning doing the unglamorous part of conservation, it is one of the more genuine things on offer near Chengdu.
The centre sets the day's activities and can restrict them without notice. Wear clothes and closed shoes you are willing to ruin, and bring a change for the afternoon.
Lunch and transport are included; entrance charges and any volunteer programme payment set by the centre are handled separately. The afternoon sites both involve walking on uneven paving, and Chengdu afternoons are humid even when overcast.
Open it to pick a date and work out the price.
What the fare covers, and what to budget for separately.
The practical detail, and the answers people actually ask for.
One of the greatest poets in the Chinese language. He arrived here in 759 as a refugee from the An Lushan Rebellion and wrote about a fifth of his surviving work in roughly four years.
The autumn wind stripping the thatch from his roof, and neighbourhood boys carrying it off while he shouted after them.
Not with self-pity. He turns outward and wishes for a vast mansion to shelter every poor scholar in the world, saying he would die content in his broken hut if such a building existed.
The building is a reconstruction. The site is not, which is what makes standing in the garden worth doing.
A statesman so admired that Chinese schoolchildren still learn his memorials to the throne by heart, twelve hundred years after he wrote them.
Liu Bei's — the emperor Zhuge Liang served. Two separate shrines were merged, and the name that stuck was the minister's.
Weighing and preparing bamboo and panda cake, recording behaviour on a chart, and cleaning enclosures. It is work rather than an encounter.
No. Contact is limited or absent depending on the rules in force that day, and the centre can restrict activities without notice.