Yangtze 3 gorges river cruise
Trip Start
Jul 11, 2006
1
10
32
Trip End
Jun 28, 2007
Chongqing,
China
Tuesday, September 5, 2006
So we boarded the boat at 6ish; it wasn't too bad and certainly better than what I was expecting! We'd seen photos of the cabin in a brochure but that was a new boat and I wasn't too optimistic about what we were going to get. Fortunately is was ok, clean and it had A/C that seemed to work, at the beginning anyhow, but by the end of the trip I think it was worn out or something. It had space for 4 and some Chinese guy turned up at our door, seen 3 westerners and started mouthing off at the cabin crew; we didn't see him after that meaning we had a cabin to ourselves
Another case of Chinglish
. I was kind of expecting other Westerners on the boat, but I only spotted one guy, the rest of the boat was filled with Chinese tourists.We grabbed some of the food from the restaurant for dinner. It turned out to be very bland but the portions were huge so I was happy! We knocked back a few beers later on to round off the day. The food didn't go down to well with Claire who ended staying up all night being sick! Me and Natalie were fine though? [Clare, I feel for you when you get to India, it wont get any better! I hear KFC is big out there, stick to that...hehe]
The following morning we were rudely woken by our tour guide hammering on the door at 6.30, for a tour of some temple. With Claire resigned to bed me and Natalie headed off, all weary eyed and not really in the mood for it. As always, the guide spoke zero English so me and Natalie headed off on our own, climbing the hill (Not too big though we did sweat profusely), not taking the tourist-rip-off cable car. Seriously, it wasn't that big but all the Chinese tourists took the cable car. A temple for tourists, rebuilt for tourists and geared out for tourists. It was unimpressive after seeing real versions in Mongolia. We were meant to go and see the Ghost City while we were there but we forgot and only remember when we arrived back at the boat. What a shame, I'm sure it would have been fantastic, totally devoid tourist shops and alike, yeah right
Another part of the 3rd gorge
. Everywhere in China there is someone waiting around the corner waiting to sell you something, usually at a totally inflated price compared to what the locals pay, it's annoying!We just chilled out for the rest of the day whilst Claire was put on to an IV drip and given a myriad of tablets to take.
The following day we headed out on a small boat cruise up the Little Three Gorges. They are a lot smaller than the other 3 gorges but even more spectacular. Huge cliffs climb out of the water, probably well over a thousand feet upwards [check out the pix]. I thought it was going to be a little trip but it turned into a 5 hour round trip, with several stops to visit 'points of interest', the pathways to which were of course littered with tourist shops. When we got back we had the opportunity to go to a free 'Chinese show' in the town where we were docked. A little apprehensive and in need of food and water, we got on the bus there anyway (By this point we had met two other westerners, big shout to Tim and Sue!) We had some time to kill before the show started, so we found a restaurant and managed to order some food after Sue trawled through the phrase book, without which it would have meant choosing randomly (and possibly getting something like dog or rat knowing me!)
The show was ok, bit like a school play, with some crazy (very loud!) singing. Tim volunteering himself to get up at one point; all the Chinese were laughing, but as always, the show was in Chinese and we didn't have a clue what was going on! We got the bus back to the boat and finished off the evening with a few beers.
Another view down the river
So all of our included tours were done now, and if we wanted we could go and see another temple, or view the dam, all at an extra cost. Obviously the temple was out of the question as I didn't fancy walking around another tourist trap. The dam was more appealing, but at 12 quid it was quite expensive. After a lot of deliberation I decided to bite the bullet and go for it. As one girl said to me when I was on the deck of the boat (I met another westerner, maybe they were hiding in their rooms?), how often do you get the chance to see the biggest dam in the world? Not everyday, so I stumped up the cash and headed off on the bus with all the other tourists.
First stop was some crappy aquarium where marine life from the river are on display. It seemed like a bit of a conspiracy to me; how anything could live in the filth of the river is beyond me! It's completely polluted, not unlike the rest of China, and is a dodgy muddy brown colour. After we headed to the top of the dam, and after some super tight security (they let me take my camera but not my ipod???), we jumped on a golf cart and got driven along the top of the dam to the middle. It was amazing, absolutely huge and a masterpiece of engineering, even though it will have severe side effects. It will submerge thousands of square km of farmland and displace almost a million people, meaning they will have to start new lives in new towns
Looking down the right-hand side of the dam
. The Chinese Government doesn't care though, with the electricity generation capacity equivalent to 19 nuclear power stations, it's an easy solution to the energy crisis in China. Me and an American girl were the last to leave the dam top and we didn't know we had to be back at a certain time. When we got on to the bus the tour guide was going nuts, the bus driver looked grim, and all the Chinese tourists slow clapped us and moaned at us. We were only 10 minutes late!! Next was another viewing point, looking down on to the dam, followed by another view point down at the bottom of the dam. Here we were lucky enough to see one of the flood gates opening, which is very rare apparently. The size of the dam is completely overwhelming, at 2km long and something like 100m tall, its HUGE!After that, yet another 'temple', complete with mini tourist shop village! I quickly glanced round it, as did the others and then we sat down and got some food. We were meant to go and see another show afterwards but by the time we had finished our food we had missed the bus- what a shame, I really fancied another show...hmmmm. During this whole trip our boat had made its way through the massive ship dock next to the dam and docked up outside the temple.
It was only a few hours journey to our final destination of Yichang, then an express bus to Wuhan (where there are good rail connections). We thought we would be getting up to catch the bus at 3am, after heading to bed around 11.30ish we were told to get up at 12, and be ready to leave soon. Great, zero sleep...
All in the all the river cruise was pretty good, but I was expecting something out-of-this-world, which it wasn't. Maybe it's because I've seen so much cool and spectacular stuff so far, that now things need to more impressive than the last.??? I don't know really. I enjoyed it and that is the main thing, along with the fact that in a few years the 3 gorges won't exist as the dam floods them.
Wuhan then Hong Kong next...
Comments
us again!
wow thankyou you made us semi famous!! even if it was for being sick! hope ur havin fun back in china, take care and keep us posted xx