Jiuzhaigou tour and my pictures

Jiuzhaigou, is famous for snow white mountains, blue color lakes, long continuous waterfalls and multi colored leaves (if you go in Autumn). It is situated in Northern Sichuan of China and between 1,990m (6,529 feet) to 4,764m (15,630feet) above sea level. Jiuzhaigou (Nine Village Valley) was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1992.

I went to Chengdu, Sichuan, China for Jiuzhaigou tour on 27 October 2014. Went up Jiuzhaigou by flight from Chengdu. The minute I walk out of the plane towards the baggage claim area, I felt like it's very tiring and a headache. Oh dear, I thought that I was sick. What a relieve when a fellow passenggers also commented that they felt tired. Later I found out Jiuzhaigou airport is at an altitude of 3500m. So it is this sudden change of height and thinner air.

One of the highlights of Jiuzhaigou National Park is the multi colored lakes. Five flower lake of China is also known as the Crystalline Turqoise Blue lake which depicts a clear soothing blue color is an amazing sight to behold!

This Five Flower lake has a bottom that is crissed crossed by ancient fallen tree trunks that add to the beauty.

Jiuzhaigou National Park is made up of many waterfalls. It is basically in Rize Valley of about 18km long. There are buses plying along the route stopping at scenic spots. After buying a ticket for the entrance to Jiuzhaigou National park, one can just hop up and down any of the buses inside the park free of charge. But, if it is peak season, the queue and waiting time for the buses may be longer. I went on a tour which includes a chartered bus/van inside the park. So I felt lucky and happy because this way saves us the time and hassles rushing for the buses.

There are many types of lakes and various names of the waterfalls all along the route in Jiuzhaigou National park. Among them are the Panda Lake, Swan lake, Grass lake, Arrow Bamboo Lake, Mirror lake and Pearl Shoal Waterfall.

At Pearl Shoal, we started by walking along the Tufa. Tufa is a variety of limestone, formed by the precipitation of carbonate minerals from ambient temperature water bodies. Therefore, we can see the natural green rocks with clear water gushing through.

Then we walk along the steps going downwards along the big Pearl shoal waterfall. Everyone is jostling for a better spot to snap pictures.

                            Pearl Shoal is 110m long and tapers off to about 330m in length.

Mirror Lake, where perfect total reflection occurs. Here, seemingly the reflection appears nicer than the top original view.

Bamboo Lake, can you spot where is the water level line? It looks like a whole scenic picture, right? It is actually a mountain behind and a lake infront but the clear reflection blends very thing in perfectly. There is the ancient dead wood trunk/branch in the foreground under the water.

Scenic multicolored trees and turquoise water lake, picture taken by a normal compact camera and Ipad. 

All photographs in this blog are taken by myself, an amateur photographer. Personally, to me the main attraction of Jiuzhaigou National Park is a lot of big, long waterfalls and colorful lakes. To visit this park, one has to definitely stay overnight in Jiuzhai Valley for two nights. Because Jiuzhaigou National Park takes a whole day to visit, so early morning we need to enter the national park. Then it will be going up and down the internal shuttle bus to take snap photographs at the various scenic spots until evening.

Thank you for visiting this blog post.

Related post: Another world heritage site nearby Huanglong National Park