Outbound flights connect Chengdu to major cities across China, and also to Lhasa in Tibet. The airport bus (¥8) leaves from outside the airline offices on Renmin Lu around twice an hour until 6.30pm; check times when you buy your ticket. Currently, China Southwest ticket-holders with early departures can get a free night at the airport hotel, though this offer is not valid for Lhasa flights.

Chengdu is roughly halfway along the Xi'an-Kunming rail line, and also connected to routes into Guizhou and central China through easterly Chongqing - though it's actually much quicker to reach Chongqing itself by bus along the new expressway. The rail ticket office is on the eastern side of the main train station square, where phenomenally solid, long queues are almost kept in order by police. Destinations are listed in Chinese over windows; number #5 provisionally handles foreigners. If you don't fancy spending an hour or two in line, try the booking office at the Railway Travel Hotel, or employ an agent.

Leaving by bus, you'll find station services overlap, but generally the North station is most useful for short-range traffic to Dujiangyan, Qingcheng Shan and Guanghan; Ximen concentrates on northern and western destinations; while those from Xinnanmen head south and east - though there are also sleeper buses to Kangding from here, and shuttles to Leshan and Emei Shan from all three stations. The stations are fairly user-friendly, but organize long-distance tickets a day in advance. You need to obtain PICC travel insurance, from their office on Renmin Dong Lu (¥15-28 a day), before purchasing bus tickets to Kangding and most of western and northern Sichuan.

Getting to Tibet requires extra planning. Bad times to try are during March (the month the Dali Lama fled Tibet) or November (the month the Chinese arrived in Lhasa), as the possibilty of demonstrations means that Tibet may be suddenly closed, or that you'll only be allowed in on a very expensive and restrictive CITS tour. Otherwise, rules are fluid: sometimes airline offices will sell you your plane ticket and a permit (which you never set eyes on) for next-day travel at ¥1300, but generally authorities insist that you join a "tour group" organised by an agent. These cost ¥1800-2000, and include the flight, permit, airport transfers, two nights' dorm accommodation in Lhasa, and a two-day Lhasa tour - though here the length of time you can stay in Tibet is limited only by your Chinese visa, and there's no compunction to actually take the tour. You may, however, have to wait several days in Chengdu for enough people to sign up.

Chengdu doesn't make a good place to start a journey overland to Tibet . First enquiries must be made at the Chengdu PSB, and failing help there, CITS, though the visa to enter Tibet by road is virtually impossible to obtain: the price is variously quoted at between ¥450 and US$1000 per person, it takes weeks to arrange, and you'll have to provide a detailed itinerary of your movements and stick to it. Even with official permission, you may find travel is an uphill struggle - trucks won't take you (they risk crippling fines), buses are reluctant to let you on and local police will have the final say about letting you cross their territory. Overcome the odds, and at minimum you're looking at a two-week journey from Chengdu to Lhasa, for which you'll need copious warm clothing, food and a good deal of luck.