No amount of information could have prepared me for the first glimpse of the port at Chonging! I was walked down to the dock by someone from the travel agency, with a toothless man following along carrying my bags on a yoke like an ox. We started down a hill and the gathered mass of humanity was VERY foreign and frightening. I just stopped and mentally ran through my options. Do I bolt back to the Chonging airport and take the next flight going anywhere, or do I shove my way in and take my chances? I decided to go for the adventure, but I was utterly intimidated.
In an instant the travel agency man was gone and I was stuck pushing my way through God knows what. I just kept showing my ticket to everyone and moving forward. I made it on to the boat, used sign language and cash to get upgraded to my own 1st class cabin (which comes with 1 roll of toilet paper, but no towel), and sat in the lobby looking for another "foreigner." I saw a white guy and asked him if he spoke English. I loved his reply, "I AM English." Thank the Lord! We managed to find a German woman and an Irish girl too. So our little troop was formed. We had a ball together.
We quickly learned that not one crew member on the boat spoke or wrote a word of English. We just went with the flow for three days. I believe I might have been brainwashed from the constant gibbering on the shipwide PA system. If I start typing "power to the people..." Someone shake me! I have certainly had a cultural revolution. Some of my observances of the Chinese people were the same as Marco Polo's writings, not much changes here! I could go on for ages about the bizarre ship board happenings, but I'll just say that I started out getting nauseous looking at the food, and ended up piling mystery meat on rice and shoveling it in my mouth with chopsticks from a bowl held right under my chin. It was sink or swim when I ran out of the peanut butter and jelly I brought on board!
Back to the actual sights, along the way on the world's third largest river (after the Amazon and the Nile). The Yangzi has many names in China like China's Main Street and China's Lifeline. It starts near Tibet and flows to the East China Sea. Its watershed is about 20% of China's land mass supporting 400 million people. It would also be an understatement to say that it is very polluted. I am not having fish in this part of China.
The river banks were not as lively as my trip down the Nile because most of the life near the banks had already been relocated. So, the areas with buildings looked empty and sad. However, most of the area was rural and beautiful. The hills and mountains were other worldly in the mist. The horizontal trails up the hillsides looked like a typical Chinese painting. It was exactly as I had always imagined! The scenery became very dramatic in the three gorge areas, the sheared sides of the cliffs were majestic. The first, Qu Tang Gorge, was the most amazing of the three. It is even pictured on the back of the 10 yuan note. It was truly something else to sit on the deck and look up at this forgotten part of the world.
Every five or six hours a bell would ring and we would have a clue that the boat was docking for a little trip. I started to feel like one of Pavlov's dogs. Thank God I took some notes at the Three Gorge Museum, with that and the Lonely Planet, we deciphered what we were about to see! The first stop we literally climbed a mountain (OK a big hill) and saw Ghost City. The many temples were designed for those whose souls who were not going to heaven to stick around and cry their eyes out for the life they led. My favorite part was a large hanging bridge we crossed. The sign read, to minimize danger do not stay on the bridge too long. Great advice I thought! After the dam project is complete this area of temples will be an island.
We also stopped and climbed a spectacular wooden pagoda, Shi Bao Camp. When the river rises the locals say this pagoda with its wall around it will be the largest bonzi in the world!
Perhaps the best side trip of the journey was the "little boat" trip to see the three mini gorges. We boarded smaller boats and then even smaller boats to get into the lush area. The little gorges were intimate and inspiring. I was befriended by a 13 yr old girl, who's name means Rainbow, and her family. Her English was excellent and we talked all day. It was the first time I knew what the tour guides on the trip were saying! She wants to practice her English and become a lawyer or a doctor one day. Too cute! At all the stops her Mom gave me something to try like watermelon (they are small and round here) and corn cooked in the husk. It was a great day!
The last marvel of the trip was passing through the Yangzi Dam. We hit the locks at about 11pm and stayed up to watch the sight. We went through four locks, packed very closely with five other ships, and when the project is finished there will be five locks in total. It made me want to be an engineer and work on something so monumental! What an accomplishment. I have a million questions about dam projects now and plan to do a little research to better understand the process. What a powerful thing!
My Yangzi Cruise was incredible. I feel like I got a truly authentic Chinese experience. It was amazing to see the combination of an ancient natural wonder and a man-made wonder in progress.
Traveler's Note:
If I were giving advice, I would suggest booking the same trip on the Victoria Cruise Line, which we saw at several stops. They had a few more "foreigners" on board and some site tours in English. The ship also looked like you might get silverware and towels too. But, I'm sure you would pay considerably more than my $175 for the first class 3 day/3 night cruise on the Chinese ship.
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