Yichang Three Gorges Dongshan H

... seeing people in parks practising their tai chi or whatever, but this was in a different league! There were separate groups of people all the way along, engaged in ballroom dancing, line dancing, aerobics and wafty-armed Chinese dancing... it was a sight to behold, and the good spirits emanating from the area put me in great form for my walk back to the station.<br><br> The entertainment continued in the waiting ...

Alison: We stayed in our first hotel of the trip in Yichang and though it was a pretty basic room, we loved it! Such a nice change from the hostels we had become used to. The best part was the bathroom which we were pleased to see had a western toilet. The previous accomodation only had the traditional Chinese toilet aka a fancy hole in the floor that you have to crouch over....we like to call them crouchers :-) These toilets ...

... br>Someone somehow suggested it would be great to go see the new Three Gorges Dam and me without doing much research said 'mei wenti' (no problem). 5 cups of coffee, 20 chocolate bars, 7 instant soups, a roll of toilet paper, 12 lollipops, 3 movies, 8 computer recharges, keeping warm under newspapers and 16 hours and hundreds of kilometres sitting on a hard seat we arrived in lovely Yichang at 1am!! The only thing that was lovely for a mother and ...

... we were having breakfast the ship left port and headed down the Yangzi in the heavy rain, with the mountains around us shrouded by the heavy mist. The wide river valley had a changing scenery of towns, factories and sloping fields set against the mountain sides with many new suspension bridges crossing the river. What was becoming evident was that the river, which had a wild reputation in the past and when in flood, had caused thousands of deaths, had now become ...

... in which I was staying had a western toilet was a very pleasant surprise though... The first day I was starting to regret my decision a bit; I had bought a bunch of ramen noodles and various snacks from the grocery store since I heard the boat food was expensive and not too tasty, and the weather, while not rainy, was extremely foggy. The second day we got to the Three Gorges Dam, but the visibility was so poor I could barely see 50 feet ahead of ...

... people whose nation we began - thanks for your unwitting permission, David! The first day of our 3-day cruise down the Yangzi took us to the world famous Three Gorges Dam. The Dam is China's biggest engineering project since The Great Wall. When it is finished in 2012 it will rank as the world's largest dam and will flood an area the size of Singapore and wash away the homes of up to 2 million people. It measures 185m high and 2km wide and will have the ...

The cruise lasted three days and three nights for us. The other passengers stayed on another day to get to the same place, but we needed to get moving. Anyway, the cruise was great. For those that care, we were on the boat that THE picture that Lonely Planet includes for the cruise highlight. We shared the boat with MANY American retirees on a Grand Central Tour, a small German tour and one really cool English chick ...

... the first Chinese city that comes to mind. After my very enjoyable visit to Zhangjiajie, which I'm sure that you have all read about in my last entry, I needed to find a convenient place along the railway from which I could both visit an interesting site, and easily reach Shanghai. After some deliberation, I chose Yichang, the second largest city in the province of Hubei, and I arrived several weeks ago, right off of the train. The reason I chose this place was its proximity to ...

... us up the river! We felt so guilty. The trackers used to wear hessian clothing and when it got wet it would chafe so they would take it off and do their work naked. This has been exploited by the tourism industry who are selling postcards of their bare backsides for everyone to laugh at. The whole thing made me sad. The men who pulled our boats were doing it in ill-fitting underpants and hand made shoes. They've been ...

... to breathe. I cannot stop thinking that this journey is 8 hours and i am thinking that i value my sanity too much too stay on this train! The train starts moving, we manage to get our backpacks stowed. I see a sign with the carridge capacity of 120 persons. A quick headcount reveals that we are only around 100 people over! The next thing everyone is squeezing further to let through someone, no it cant be, a damn trolley service! And then a ...