White Emperor City
Trip Start
Jul 08, 2007
1
8
31
Trip End
Sep 13, 2007
White Emperor City,
China
Sunday, July 15, 2007
We got off the boat where we had spent the night and got off. Our new local guide met us on the warf and directed us to a smaller boat that took us up one of the rivers into the more scenic area that the big boats cannot reach so it was more private and quiet!! We got the seats in the sun on the top deck and watched the scenery as it went by with the guide gicing us stories about the area we were passing through and pointing out sights that we should see.
We were on the same boat as the GAP tour so it was good to see them again and spent the day with them. We went through the small gorges, starting with Misty Gorge, then through to where there are the hanging cofins. A long time ago the chinese put their dead in coffins and place them in caves on the side of the gorges, the higher up you were the better. (pic when i can find a computer that will let me...) Its really imprisive how they got the coffins to the caves!!!
Throughout the whole trip we saw where the level of the river would rise to. its 175m above sea level and it think 20m above where it is now, there are still some people who will have to move before the water reaches that high...
Throught to Emarld Gorge where we saw people cleaning the banks of the river of garbage and other stuff thrown in the river. Finally up to the the furthest point up the river we go to on that boat, where we got off and had a walk around. There is a tourist trap of a buddist temple nestled on the banks of the river. I think its a tourist trap because it never was a working temple and you have to pay to get in.... I guess it would be alright if that was the only temple that you had time to go to but we will be going to many other temples on the trip, all much better as they are actually working temples where buddism is practiced!!
We then got back on the boats for a short trip where we got on some even smaller boats which took us up some even smaller gorges. On the boat we all had to put on these really big and vivigly orange life vests!! Along the way farmers from the local area were hidden in the bishes singing to us, it sounded good!! you rounded a corner and the sound came to you from a hidden hut on the hill.
It was just a short round trip and on the way back the two boat guys sund a sort of call and answer singing, one would startsinging and once he finished the otherfrom the other side of the boat would sing back. It sounded great!! and it was a triditional chinese song. Back at the where we got this small boat we got back on the medium size boat which took us back through the gorges through Monkey Gorge where we saw, guess what... yep, Monkeys!! And finally back to the big boat which took us to Feng Jie where we dissembarket and made the long trek up the stairs to where we met the bus that took us to the hotel. Again this was with the GAP tour.
The hotel we stayed at was a bit back from the river on a hill and from our balcony you could see the scene from the back of the 10 Yuan note. You know that sometimes when you see a bed you just have to do a superman dive onto it?? Well today i had on of those urges when getting into my room. I dumped my bagand did a flying leap onto the bed.... where i bounced... I didnt sink in as you usually do but i dounced up... and it hurt!! The bed was as hard as a rock and had no give in it at all!! the beds on the train are softer than this bed!! Later asking George about it he said that the people in this area think that hard beds are good for you. Even if that is true i would much rather sleep in a soft bed!!!
A group of us had dinner at the hotel; we went to the resturant where all of the tablles together, started to sit down at on of the tables but were told to stop and moved into a private room. Whial this was nice i would have prefered eating with everyone else, i think they didnt want to have westeners in their restruant??
After dinner we all grouped in the lobby from where we went down the street to a store that had some automatic Marjong machines where George taught us how to play Marjong (i think thats the right spelling, no spell checks here!!) Its a lot like rummy and i dont think iv played that game before. I really like Marjong!! And had great fun playing for the next two hours!! at first the locals grouped around us 'helping' us play marjong, it was actually like they were playing through us!! But as i got better i asked them not to help at all. I lost the next few but got better!!! and ended up wining the last two rounds!!
Then its back to the hotel where the rock bed awates....
