Wolong Panda Reserve – The Best Place to Do the Panda Volunteer Job and Panda Habitat Exploration Tour

Known as the home to the Giant Panda and a precious bio-gene bank, Wolong National Nature Reserve is a heaven for people who love giant pandas. More than one hundred pandas once inhabited there, accounting for over 10% of the nation's total.

Wolong National Nature Reserve

Located in the southwestern Wenchuan County, 130km away from Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province, Wolong National Nature Reserve is one of the World Natural Heritages in China. In 1980, Wolong National Natural Reserve had been placed on UNESCO Man and Biosphere Reserve Network. After the Wenchuan Earthquake, Wolong National Natural Reserve had been reconstructed into a better ideal place for living and reproduction of giant pandas for its warm and humid climate which breeds good bamboo which is panda’s favorite food.

Bamboo is panda’s favorite food

Being different from other regular zoos, Wolong Panda Reserve provides wild natural environment for pandas so that they would never be kept in cages. While touring in the reserve, you may come across cute pandas accidently. There are several zones in the reserve according to different functions like Baby Panda Zone, Sub-adult Panda Zone, Breeding Zone and Wildness Training Zone.

Baby panda in Baby Panda Zone

The Entrance fee for Wolong National Nature Reserve is 15 RMB and 20 RMB for separately tour in Panda Museum. There is another center named Shenshuping Panda Center charging 60 RMB which is a new panda center that was built in Shenshuping of Gengda Town in the reserve and put into use since Oct. 30, 2012 sponsored by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, so that it is free for Hong Kong citizens with valid ID and children under 1.3m. The opening hours is 09:30 to 16:00, which only takes you half a day for a rough tour.

Panda specimen in Panda Museum

How to go to Wolong National Natural Reserve

Owing to the devastating earthquake happened in Wenchuan, the road connecting Chengdu and Wolong is not on a good condition.

From Chengdu to Wolong Panda Base

There is no direct public bus connecting Chengdu and Wolong National Natural Reserve.

You can take the subway line 2 to Chadianzi Coach Station, buy a ticket to Xiaojin County or Wolong Town and get off at Wolong. The ticket price is about 40 RMB and takes you 3 hours.

From Wolong to Wolong National Natural Reserve, you can take a taxi or public bus, which costs you about 10 RMB. For a chartered car, the price would be more expensive.

From Dujiangyan to Wolong Panda Base

You can take the public bus at Dujiangyan Coach Station to Wolong which costs 21 RMB and around 2 hours.

NOTES:

There are also more panda bases in Sichuan like Bifengxia Panda Base, Chengdu Panda Base and Dujiangyan Panda Valley, which are all in different locations and separated far away from each other.

Among all these panda bases, Wolong National Natural Reserve has the most amount of Panda when Chengdu Panda Base is the nearest one to Chengdu which only takes you 1-hour by taking the internal city bus.

If you have already had the plan to go to Ya’an, Bifengxia Panda Base is a good choice.

Dujiangyan Panda Base provides a chance for tourists to hold a panda to take a photo as long as tourists book in advance.

In all these panda bases, tourists have to behavior themselves properly, and the opening hours of different panda bases are different. Please check the time before you go.

Panda Volunteer Job Tour in Wolong Panda Base

There are 2 kinds of panda volunteer job according to different ages and different size scalp of groups offered by Wolong Panda Base.

1. Sample Itinerary of 2 Day Chengdu to Wolong Panda Base Tour

Travel Route: Chengdu-Wolong (1 Night)-Chengdu

This route is available all year around for people at age of 12 to 55, which is most suitable for family with kids. The tour price is 238 RMB per person and the group size is maximally 30 people.

In the 1st day, the tour bus will pick up tourists at 8:00 for free within the 2rd ring road in Chengdu and then transfer to Wolong Panda Research Center. After 3-hour ride, tourists will arrive at Wolong in the noon and the visit the panda compound within the Nature Reserve in the afternoon. However, the private car is used only when there are at least 6 tourists in the group, otherwise you have to take the public tour bus to Wolong. Tourists will stay overnight in hotels in Gengda.

In the morning on the 2nd day, tourists will be led by professional panda keeper to enter the panda rooms after heading to Panda Research Center and register for panda care. Going to the panda rooms, you will experience cleaning the leftovers of bamboo and removing panda dung when you can learn much more about panda care, panda natural habitat and their behavior, after which the staff will take you to visit the giant panda gardens and closely contact with these cute pandas by feeding them with fresh bamboo from 11:00 to 12:00.

Cleaning the leftovers of bamboo

In the afternoon, tourists will learn how to make steamed corn bread which would be used to feed pandas by themselves. The last schedule is watching documentaries about how can pandas return to the wild nature after years of feeding by human.

The tourists can feed pandas by themselves

The tour ends by going back from Wolong to Chengdu.

NOTES:

1. Tourists should pay down payment to book the tour in advance.
2. Tourists should provide the latest body check report.
3. Keep the nature reserve clean.

2. Sample Itinerary of 3 Day Chengdu to Wolong Panda Base Tour with Panda Habitat Exploration

Travel Route: Chengdu-Wolong (2 nights)-Chengdu

This route which is suitable for all levels of fitness and adults from 18 to 55 years old, is available all year round as well. Compared with the 2-day tour, its more informative and tourists will have a deeper understanding of Panda’s mysterious living habit and life. The group size is max 6.

In the 1st day, tourists would be picked up in Chengdu at 8:00 and go to Wolong in 3 hours. After arriving at Wolong Nature Reserve, tourists will be led by the staff to tour the nature reserve and visit panda compound. You will stay at a hotel in Gengda.

In the 2nd day, tourists will experience cleaning bamboo leftovers, learning more knowledge about panda’s behavior, visiting panda gardens, feeding pandas with bamboo, making steamed corn bread and watching documentaries.

You will experience cleaning bamboo leftovers

In the 3rd day, tourists will gather together at Panda Research Center and warm up for the trekking tour. The panda research guide and professional guide will lead tourists trekking to the natural habitat of giant pandas in the pristine forest, in which you will have a picnic as lunch. Trekking in the forest, tourists will know how to recognize the wild panda dung with others’, and communicate with their species according to the sound and the dung. After lunch, you will keep tracking wildlife in the forest and going back to Chengdu in 17:00.

The giant panda in natural habitat

NOTES:

1. Forest is very dangerous, please do closely follow the instructions of the professional staff and never leave the tea randomly. Otherwise all the responsibility should be carried by yourself.
2. You have to buy the life insurance.
3. Provide health report proving your physical condition.
4. There are alternative plans for safety concerns when it comes to the unforeseeable situations like bad weather and natural disasters.