Trevor & Jonathans Cruise & Trip to the Far East and Australia 2016

Day 57 - Tuesday July 5th 2016 - Cruising the Yangtze River, China

It was around 05:15 in the morning that we became aware that the Chinese were waking or going for breakfast or practicing Thai Chi or whatever it is they do at this ungodly hour. Seriously you just hear them shouting down the corridors, in their cabins and no matter how hard we tried to sleep again it was just not going to work.

By the time the ship announcements started at seven we gave in to it and got up and showered slowly feeling both tired and a bit angry that this had been the second time now. We had skipped one of the optional trips off the boat this morning to the White Emperors City. This was because partly the description did not sound like we were going to see anything new and it actually was not a city at all and partly because it was off the ship at eight and we just did not want to get going that early not after everything we have done on this trip, this part was meant to be relaxing.

We had already docked by the time we were up this morning, we were

sandwiched between two other river boat cruise boats, our view balcony into balcony. The town / village we had docked at was built into the hillside so everything was uphill and from the boat and looking up there did not seem to be much there so we passed on that as well. Instead we sat up on deck five writing up the blogs and trying to get the staff to make us a decent coffee. That proved to be a mission impossible and after two attempts we gave up and Trev went for an orange juice instead.

One of the Americans on board and at our dining table had said that she had heard that Shanghai was going to be experiencing a typhoon and that they were expecting serious delays on flights. We purposely avoided connecting to the internet to look, after our panic of getting on the boat in the first place what will be will be so well find out all about it when we get to the airport.

We spent a bit of time down in the cabin watching, the boat wasn’t moving anywhere just yet so until the guests got back on this was it.

By 11:30 we were on the move again, this time for some of the scenery we had joined this cruise for in the first place. We would be travelling through one of the shortest gorges along the Yangtze, only running for about 6km but we have to say it was really stunning. The gorge was called Qu Tang. We stood at the front of the boat watching as we cruised it length. The high mountains on both sides completely covered with intense greenery.

Sometimes the Chinese can be so loud especially one man on board that seems to be able to get his voice heard no matter what and he has one volume, extremely loud. The guide was making announcements over the ships P.A. about where we were and what we were looking at, a commentary on the Yangtze but as soon as the English translation was being spoken he boomed drowning it all out, oblivious to the westerners onboard. Maybe he’s the one waking us up every morning at 5am?

After the excitement of the gorge we headed back to the cabin for a bit of peace, watching the world go by from the balcony. As we said yesterday the scenery can get very monotonous so you don’t feel the ned to constantly look out. We went to lunch; it was much better than dinner last night, at least it wasn’t greasy pork like last night which had been more like fat in a sauce. Jonathan had the Kung Po Chicken something that he orders from the takeaway menu at home but this was different but edible. It was more nuts in a sauce and after a while he felt more like a squirrel eating it all. Trevor went for the chicken curry, which was ok!

The highlight of that day though was getting off the boat for our afternoons tour. As we cruised further along the river the banks at the side of the ship grey steeper and steeper with only the occasional signs of life. Sometimes you would see pagodas and temples seemingly built in the middle of nowhere and inaccessible by anything but boat. Like most things that are Chinese the rock formations here come with a story as well and peaks of mountains would be named after sorcerers because if you closed one eye and blinked the shape of the rock might look like a woman, you know what I mean, it’s as if they had been looking to make a story up about something for superstitions sake.

So the river boat came to a stop for our afternoons tour to the Goddess stream. We transferred boats onto a flotilla of small power boats all with Chinese pagoda style roofs on.

We were to motor upstream for about an hour then come back on ourselves along the same route with a stop to hear some local singing and dancing.

The best part of the trip to be honest was just seeing The Yangtze from a different perspective, much lower in the river and getting to really feel just how high the mountains are over all these waterways. Before the Three Gorges Dam was built this river that we were cruising down was little more than a brook, sometimes you would have to get out of your boat and pull it over the shallow waters.

We took in the views, more crumbling limestone, more staggering vistas. We topped on a floating pontoon area where the local guides sang songs and demonstrated local dances form within the remote Yangtze regions, it was all Chinese to us (literally) and to be honest felt a bit Disney, put on for the tourists.

Back on aboard after our little trip up the stream we had to attend the briefing regarding getting off the boat tomorrow and how that would all work, pay the bill that sort of stuff and with that it was time for a very quick change and The Captains Farwell Dinner.

It was virtually a carbon copy of the Captains reception just the other day. The senior crew all lined up outside the entrance to the restaurant, being given a glass of sparkling Chinese wine to toast. The crew came into the dining Auld Lang Syne complete in Chinese and with more verses than we knew the song even had.

You can’t knock the staff of this boat at all, they have really tried hard with what they have to make it a good trip and the girls behind the bar are always so smiley and giggly even when we can tell that they have not got a clue what we are on about.

Over the course of dinner conversation around our mixed bag table revolved around politics. Mainly what was happening in the EU now that the UK were out and what was going on in the US presidential race between Clinton & Trump. The general feeling seemed to be that the world had gone mad and it was time to hit the reset button.

We downed a bottle of wine over dinner, making the most of our al inclusive package but what we were all really waiting for was entering the locks at the Three Gorges Dam.

It was around half past nine at night that we became aware that we were nearing the Dam itself. The water of the Yangtze seemed to stop moving as if a millpond. We could see the bright of of lights looking like they were floating across the water. We had been sailing on the high side of the Dam so the lights that we could see were from the very top of the Dam itself.

Approaching the locks was something else. Like something out of a science fiction movie, all massive bits of metal and huge walls of concrete. It really does look a bit like an airport runway with all the lights and the reflections on the water. The lock itself is big enough to allow two riverboat cruise ships to go down at the same time (and presumably splits the cost as well?). We motored through these gigantic steel doors that must have the craziest amount of pressure up against them when they are closing. When we entered the lock the water height had been 150m and by the time we had navigated the first the water level was down to 135m. We didn’t really feel any of it on the boat, your aware that you are lower as the surroundings change and what was once a short wall is not some 50m tall. There are four locks in total that take you through the Dam but we only stayed up to capture our travel through the first one. It was already 11 o’clock at night and we had a 6am alarm tomorrow as we are off the boat again to o and visit the Dam itself and then we transfer to the airport for another big travel day..