Wenchuan was hit by a magnitude 7.8 earthquake today. Wenchuan is about 60 miles NW of Chengdu. It is our base for routes on Jiudingshan and is somewhere we pass through on our way to a number of our other destinations. In Chengdu we felt a fairly significant tremor, but all our staff escaped uninjured and there was no serious damage to our office or homes. Some broken glass and a few cracks in the walls, but Chengdu itself escaped relatively unscathed.

Phone networks are still down but I've been listening to the local radio all day (whilst sat in gridlocked traffic), and it seems that there's surprisingly little damage to Chengdu and the surrounding towns. A few buildings have collapsed, but not a huge number of injuries/fatalities in the grand scheme of things. We are unable to contact our local guides near Wenchuan but at the moment there is nothing to suggest that they are in any danger. Most of us will be back in the office tomorrow, but it might take us a little while to get things straight and work through our emails. Rest assured that we're all OK and we will be back in touch soon.