Sichuan is a province in western China with its capital at Chengdu. The current name of the province is kept after "Four circuits of rivers and gorges", named after the division of the existing circuit into four during the Northern Song Dynasty. The area lies in the Sichuan basin and is surrounded by the Himalayas to the west, Qinling range to the north, and mountainous areas of Yunnan to the south. The Yangtze River flows through the basin and thus is upstream to areas of eastern China. The Minjiang River in central Sichuan is a tributary of the upper Yangtze River, which it joins at Yibin.
The climate is highly variable. The Sichuan Basin (including Chengdu) in eastern half of the province experiences a subtropical monsoon climate with long, warm to hot, humid summers and short, cool to cold, dry and cloudy winters, with China's lowest sunshine totals. The western areas have a mountainous climate characterised by very cold winters and mild summers, with plentiful sunshine. The southern part of the province, including Panzhihua, has a sunny, subtropical climate with very mild winters and hot summers.
Bordering provinces: Chongqing Municipality, Tibet Autonomous Region, Qinghai, Gansu, Shaanxi, Guizhou and Yunnan. |
