We arrived in Chengdu the capital of Szechwan Province after a long but straightforward flight from Manchester. I whiled away the time immersed in the gripping account of the same but very different journey taken in 1931/32 by Burdsall and Emmons, the first men to climb Minya Konka in the 'Alps of Chinese Tibet'.

day 1

Their journey actually started from New York which they left in November 1931, finally making it to Chengdu in July 1932. Tomorrow our group will gather and we are off to see the famous Chengdu Pandas before making final preparations for our journey into 'the interior', as Burdsall and Emmonds would have put it.

day 2

The next morning we met up with our guide Aron, a young man wiser than his years ought to allow and wearing a smile wider than China. After our first meeting and a briefing on the days ahead, we boarded our tour bus and drove through the sprawling city to the Panda Research Centre. This is a must do for anyone visiting Chengdu - it's what the city is famous for and the stencilled images of the cute black and white bears are literally everywhere, on taxis, banks and soup packets. The visit was certainly worth it. Set in a large landscaped park containing a lake and extensive bamboo forest, the Pandas live in a habitat as close to their natural environment as it is possible to get outside of the wild. Visitors traverse the park on walkways separated from the Pandas only by a dry moat and a low fence making for an intimate experience. This is not a zoo and priority here is with Pandas. Visitors are expected to be quiet, walk slowly and avoid flash photography. The most important function of the centre is to ensure the continuance of the Panda as a species as there are fewer than 1600 left in the world. Tomorrow we head for the hills.

Day 3 and beyond…

A day of spectacular driving on a journey reminiscent of the Karakoram Highway in Pakistan. There is something very special about following the course of a great Asian river with the powerful torrent below and steep forested hillside rising almost vertically above up into the clouds. Small settlements and larger towns cling precariously to the cliff side, while our road leaps across narrows in the gorge, carried on arched or suspended bridges. At intervals a particularly large meander provides a fleeting opening up of the view, revealing yet taller hills above the towering walls of the gorge. The massive scale of the landscape is hard to comprehend and quite humbling. Our drive from Chengdu to Kangding today took 8 hours. For Burdsall and Emmons on the 1932 first ascent of Minya Konka, this was an 8 day journey by bus, rickshaws and sampan!

Back in Changdu

The KE clients were unanimous in their verdict that this holiday provided some of the best trekking, most varied scenery and interesting cultural experiences to rival any destination in their experience. I can only agree that this has been one of the best short treks I have undertaken. It is hard to pick a single highlight from so many, but for me it was climbing through cloud clinging to the wooded slopes above the Gonga Shan monastery where we spent the night, to suddenly break out into blue sky and see the dazzling while pyramid of Minya Konka itself, the world's 41st highest peak, and it's serried ranks of satellite 6000 and 7000 metre peaks. A truly memorable trip.

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