Virtual tour opens up pandas' wild home

People use viewers to take a virtual tour of Jiuzhaigou National Park during an event at Edinburgh Zoo. The 72,000-hectare-park in China's Sichuan province is famed for its beauty and population of wild pandas. [KATIE PATON/RZSS]

Visitors to Scotland's Edinburgh Zoo got to see far beyond the perimeter of the sprawling 33-hectare-site on Tuesday and Wednesday, with many traveling halfway around the world to China's stunningly beautiful Jiuzhaigou National Park.

The virtual reality excursion was possible thanks to the Google Expeditions team, which was at the zoo for the event organized by the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland.

Other virtual tours took visitors to the Amazon Rainforest, Madagascar and Antarctica.

The technology that made the international trips possible was recently demonstrated at the Scottish Learning Festival.

Jiuzhaigou National Park, which translates as the Nine Village Valley Park, is an area of outstanding natural beauty in the north of China's Sichuan province.

The 72,000-hectare-park is famed for its multi-level waterfalls, brightly colored lakes and snow-capped mountains and was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1992 and a World Biosphere Reserve in 1997. It has been a national park since 1982.