Our Best Holidays to China - In Pursuit of Pandas

A young giant panda clinging to a tree trunk, looking curiously at the camera, surrounded by green foliage in a natural setting. — The gorgeous giant panda, native to the lowland bamboo forests of Central China, is classified as a vulnerable and conservation-reliant species.

One of our VIP customers Wendy Harris went on her holidays to China in October 2024, embarking on her fifth Wendy Wu tour, joining our bestselling nine day ‘In Pursuit of China’ adventure. (Read about Wendy’s fourth Wendy Wu tour to Costa Rica).

On tour, Wendy was able to tick off some items from her bucket list, including a visit to the Far East’s most adorable resident, the giant panda, and by travelling in the autumn, Wendy picked one of the best times to visit China. October in China is lovely, bringing warm, dry days to the north of the nation, where this tour travels and, while it can be a little wetter in the east, as Wendy mentions below, this has its advantages!

Here is the report Wendy sent us about her holiday in China.

Wendy ticked plenty of items off her bucket list, including the Terracotta Warriors…

Arriving in China

“After a seemingly short and excellent flight on board Air China’s new A350-900 from Heathrow, we arrived at Beijing’s bustling airport. Directions were in Chinese and English, so we had no problem navigating our way to meet our local guide who accompanied us to the hotel. Later that evening we met the rest of our group for the first time for dinner at a local restaurant. It was a lovely meal in great company, with plenty of laughter as we learned to use chopsticks, an essential skill to learn on holidays in China! Then to bed at our very nice hotel for a welcome sleep before setting off the next morning to see bucket list sight number one, Tiananmen Square.

The spectacle of the Chinese State Circus in Beijing

Beijing & the Great Wall

A scenic view of the Great Wall of China winding through lush green mountains under a vibrant sunset sky with orange, pink, and blue hues. — A UNESCO World Heritage Site and absolutely essential visit on holidays to China, the Great Wall of China stretches 21,000 kilometres from east to west and is considered one of the greatest architectural feats in history.

I thought I’d be amazed and a little sad knowing the square’s history, but what I didn’t expect was how huge the square was – our local guide, Stephen, told us that it can hold over one million people! On the day we visited, the square was busy with people visiting from all over China and many were wearing their colourful costumes; they found us fascinating, and we were asked to pose for photos many times as we explored.

After an extensive tour of the square and the Forbidden City, our evening treat was a visit to the Chinese State Circus, where we were treated to a show of death-defying daring and eye-popping contortionism. Our excellent national guide Summer had secured front row seats for us, and I spent the next hour on the edge of mine as acts, each more impossible than the last, appeared before us on the stage.

Bucket list item number two was a walk on the Great Wall of China. It was an early start to avoid the crowds but worth it to set foot on this truly mammoth feat of engineering that stretched out as far as the eye could see in both directions. We proudly managed to make it halfway to the top as the steps were all set at differing heights, to stop invading enemies running up them.

Xian & the Terracotta Warriors

A close-up view of the Terracotta Warriors, an ancient army of life-sized clay soldiers standing in excavated pits, part of the burial complex of China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang. — The greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th century, the Terracotta Warriors were created to be the army of Qin Shu Huan in the after life. The pits that have been excavated so far are just a small fraction of the funerary art buried with China’s first emperor.

Then it was straight onto bucket list item number three, a bullet train ride from Beijing to Xian, home of the Terracotta Warriors. For train enthusiasts any holidays to China must include a ride; we reached a top speed of 350 kilometres per hour! As the countryside whizzed by we enjoyed a Subway picnic lunch that was delivered to the train at one of our stops, a very efficient service! We passed through the massive station and transferred to our hotel to drop off our bags before a walk along the top of Xian’s beautifully preserved city walls.

Next morning was another early start to see bucket list sight number four, the awesome 2,271-year-old Terracotta Warriors. Having recently seen the Channel 5 Dan Snow documentary, we thought that we had an idea of what to expect, but the view that awaited us as we entered the first and largest pit more than exceeded our expectations. Not only do you see the army of warriors stretching out into the distance, your nose is also greeted by the smell of them, a strange odour of slightly damp clay as you walk in the door.

So much restoration is still ongoing as many of the warriors were destroyed during the peasant uprising and every head, arm and foot has to be matched to its corresponding body after being expertly repaired. Another fun fact, every single warrior has a different face, quite a feat as there are thousands of them! We also saw pits with beautifully crafted horses and chariots.

The Pandas of Chengdu

As well as giant pandas, you’ll see plenty of playful red pandas at the Giant Panda Conservation and Breeding Centre in Chengdu.

Another bullet train ride took us through the mountains and many tunnels to bring us to beautiful Chengdu, the home of the Giant Panda Conservation and Breeding Centre. The next morning bought with it bucket list item number five – the pandas themselves.

I have a vague recollection of seeing Chi Chi and An An at London Zoo as a child and remembered them as being cute and cuddly, but I was unprepared for how unbearably cute there are, and how huge. Teddy bears with big teeth and claws! There weren’t only the cuddly black and white versions but also many red pandas, some curled up like cats with their tails tucked around them, and others playing among the bushes.

The weather while we were in Chengdu was warm and rainy, but this worked in our favour. Having big fur coats, pandas don’t like hot days so were happily sitting munching bamboo shoots and posing for photos right in front of us.

With our holidays to China drawing to a close we had one last visit to Matchmaker’s Corner, where anxious parents place adverts listing all the qualities of their unmarried children in the hope of finding a partner for them. Life is so fast paced in China today and young people work so hard, that they do not have the time to meet anyone themselves. A walk through a local craft market was the ideal place to pick up some last-minute gifts before a final sleep and another excellent Air China flight home.

Pack your sense of adventure, sense of humour and an open mind, and leave any preconceptions behind, and China will surprise and delight you. It definitely did us. “

When are the best times to visit China?

As we mentioned above, October is one of the best times to visit China, but this isn’t the only great time to explore. The autumn as a whole and the spring too brings the most comfortable weather across the country – do bear in mind though that there is a ‘Golden Week’, a national holiday, the first week of October, meaning things can get pretty busy.

Read more about the weather in China.