Different mountain, different season
The Qinling sits further north: winters bite harder and spring arrives later. The working window is late spring to late autumn.
Wildlife / Foping reserve
The other panda mountain.
On the Qinling's south slope lives China's densest wild panda population — a different subspecies on a different mountain, with the four treasures of the Qinling in one forest.
Start this journey briefShaanxi · Foping County, Qinling south slope
WhereQinling south slope
Foping County, Hanzhong, Shaanxi — a high-speed rail stop on the Xi'an–Chengdu line
Scale29,240 ha
from 980 m river country to 2,904 m on Lubanzhai, more than 95% forested
PandasHighest density
roughly one wild panda per 2.5 km² in the core — the densest population in China
ExtrasThe four treasures
panda, golden snub-nosed monkey, takin and crested ibis share the same valleys
The mountain that keeps its pandas close.
The Qinling pandas are a separate story from Sichuan's: a distinct subspecies, holding out on a single mountain range much further north. Foping reserve — approved in 1978, one of the forestry ministry's three key panda reserves — protects their densest population, and the county around it is China's panda capital by density: roughly 130 wild pandas in a county of under 1,300 square kilometres.
Foping is also where the brown pandas come from. Six of the eight brown pandas ever recorded were found here, beginning with Dan Dan, rescued in the 1980s and remembered as the reserve's most famous resident. Add the Qinling four treasures — panda, golden monkey, takin and crested ibis inside one journey — and the mountain offers a wildlife week nothing in Sichuan can assemble. We have no fixed departure running here yet; it works as a custom leg reached by rail from Xi'an or Chengdu.
How a Qinling week works.
- Arrive by rail
The Xi'an–Chengdu high-speed line stops at Foping itself — under an hour from Xi'an and a few from Chengdu. The reserve's valleys begin above the town.
- Walk the research valleys
Sanguanmiao and the East River valleys are the working heart of the reserve — bamboo slopes, camera-trap stations and the ranger paths the national surveys use.
- Collect the four treasures properly
Crested ibis on the Yang county rice fields nearby, monkeys and takin in the reserve's margins — the Qinling is the one mountain where the full set is practical.
- Treat it as a custom leg
We have no fixed departure in the Qinling yet. As a custom journey it chains Xi'an's heritage with a wildlife week — a pairing Sichuan cannot copy.
What to know before you go.
Permits and rangers
Access to the reserve runs through the administration and its stations — there is no walk-in entry. We arrange it with the local stations.
Wild pandas stay theoretical
Density is the highest in China and you still will not see one. What you get is bamboo forest a panda has just left, which is its own kind of thrill.
Brown is the long shot
Six of the eight brown pandas came from this mountain. Even the rangers measure their careers by one — go for the forest, dream about the coat.
Put the Qinling in a custom route.
Foping has no fixed departure in our calendar — tell us your dates and we will build the rail-linked Qinling line.
Start a journey briefSeeing pandas in China: the honest field guide · Wolong reserve: the Sichuan comparison