Every route page on this site states its walking plainly — kilometres, hours, terrain, the highest point named — because “moderate” means nothing without them. This page collects those statements in one place so the comparison can happen honestly, and then says what the numbers leave out.
The table.
| Route | Days | Highest point | Tent nights | You carry | Runs as |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Golden monkey tour | 2 | Valley level | 0 | Day pack | Private |
| Red panda tour | 3 | 2,700 m (Wawu option) | 0 | Day pack | Private |
| Sichuan mammal tour | 8 | About 3,000 m | 0 | Day pack | Fixed departures |
| Nature-reserve hiking | 5 or 9 | 3,000 m (Wolong climb) | 0 | Day pack | Private |
| Snow leopard tour | 7 | Valley scans; sleeping 3,680 m | 0 | Day pack | Fixed departures |
| Yading photo tour | 8 | 4,900 m (park pass) | 0 | Day pack | Private |
| Minya Konka panorama | 5 | 4,500 m walking | 0 | Day pack | Private, all year |
| Wild Sichuan tour | 6 | 3,800 m (Balang) | 0 | Day pack | Private |
| Western Sichuan tour | 9 | 3,900 m (Yajiageng) | 0 | Day pack | Private |
| Gongga group trek | 9 | 4,850 m (Riuqi Pass) | 5 of 8 | Day pack | Join-in, fixed dates |
| Gongga in-depth trek | 9 | 4,950 m (Riuqi Pass) | 3 of 8 | Day pack | Private, May–Oct |
| Riwuqi trek | 4 | 4,400 m (glacier-lake day) | 2 of 3 | Day pack | Private |
| Mt. Yala trek | 5 | 4,800 m (west-face pass) | 3 of 4 | Day pack or self | Private, May–Nov |
| Self-supported Konka | 7 | 4,950 m (Riuqi Pass) | 3 of 6 | Everything, 80 L | Private, May–Oct |
| Wild Sichuan in-depth | 24 | 4,900 m (Yading park pass) | 0 | Day pack | Private |
Reading the numbers.
Three columns do most of the work. Highest point is a single moment on a single day — the Riuqi Pass at 4,950 metres is perhaps ninety minutes of the in-depth trek, not its character. Tent nights change the shape of a trip more than its difficulty: a supported camp means an earlier dinner and a colder morning, not a heavier pack. And days is really a stamina column — the 24-day journey crosses the whole of Kham, but no single day on it is harder than the hardest day of the nine-day treks.
The lowest rung is lower than you think.
The two-day golden monkey tour asks nothing of your legs — short walking on the monkeys’ ground, a hotel both nights. The red panda week is cable cars and park paths. The mammal tour is a road trip with stands. What these routes demand is not fitness but hours: early starts, patience in hides, the discipline to let an animal arrive. If you can walk a hilly city park for two hours you can do any of them, and the monkey troops and red pandas repay exactly that kind of attention.
The honest top end.
At the other end, three things separate the hard routes from the rest, and only one is altitude. The first is consecutive walking days: the in-depth trek’s day three is fourteen kilometres of moraine and scree, on day three of nine, after two days of driving. The second is descent — the long valley walk out of the Riuqi country is the day most people underestimate. The third is the self-supported trek, the only route on this list where you carry your own tent, and its page says plainly: without high-altitude tent experience, do not book it. Everyone else has a crew carrying the camp.
Choosing by legs, not labels.
The useful question is not “am I fit enough?” but “which rung of the sleeping ladder do I want, and how many passes do I want to earn?” A week of reserves and a five-day panorama hike is a stronger trip for most legs than a nine-day camp trek rushed into. Altitude behaves the same on all of them — the altitude guide covers the pacing — and the season decides the snow: the month-by-month calendar says which passes are open when. The combination page then shows how the halves fit together.
Every figure in the table checked 7 November 2026 against the route pages. Highest points are as stated on the routes, not survey absolutes.
Pick your line?
The five Konka routes, compared in detail
When each of these runs, month by month