Cruisin down the yangzi

So I’m finally in Yangshao after some serious travel after the Yangzi cruise and the internet connection is so good! I know that’s a really lame thing to be excited about but you have no idea how rare it is and how important it is for photo uploads!

I wasn’t sure what the Yangzi river cruise would be like when I booked it in Chengdu because I had met a guy who really disliked it and discouraged me from doing it. But I forged on anyway since I wasn't sure what else I wanted to do. I was also feeling a little under the weather and the thought of planning some other activity was way beyond my capacity at the time. But I'm really glad I did the tour because I met some really great people and saw some pretty spectacular things. I had to take a bus from Chengdu to Chongqing to get to where the cruise actually departed from. Since the boat was scheduled to leave at 8pm, I had some time to wander through Chongqing. Chongqing is actually China's biggest city and probably the biggest in the world with 32 million people. Yes, that's right. 32 MILLION. I can't even imagine how many people that is. But its not really on any tourist's radar since it doesn't have any historical roles or real sights. It really is just a big city with tons of skyscrapers and tons of people.

At least I was pleasantly surprised with the boat. It was a "4-star" boat and I even splurged on first class, which had 2 beds per room. I shared it with this chinese woman who didn't speak a word of English but she was quiet and clean so I didn't mind. Our room had a big ocean-view room and a good amount of space though the ceilings were low and had squat-toilets. The boat was also a chinese tourist boat. We had a tour guide but everyone only spoke Mandarin so it was a bit bewildering sometimes to figure out what we were doing or why. The best part though was the outside deck where we could admire the scenery and pass the time. I also met these 2 Dutch people, Suzanne and Frans, and 3 Brit guys, Stephen, Jamie and Conville, and we had some pretty good laughs.

Not our boat but ours was just like this. And you wonder why its so hazy here all the time.

The first day, we went to the City of Ghosts, which is an old buddhist temple that had crazy statues of demons and spirits. It was definitely interesting to see these grotesque statues in a temple very different that any other I've seen. The weirdest part of it was how kitsch-y the Chinese have made it. The Chinese don't seem to have the same respect for preserving the historical dignity of its sights but actually like to make them into these crazy spectacles. After seeing some of the old temple, we were ushered into this sort of haunted house with mechanical demon puppets and even a rickety amusement park ride. In the middle of a temple!

The fantastical statues of the City of Ghosts.

Within the temples, they had statues of buddhas and these. Pretty frightening.

We went everywhere as part of a Chinese tour group though we had no idea what the guide was saying. But we did take a classic Chinese tour picture. We finally were part of the hat people!

Mechanical puppets in the City of Ghost. Does this make sense to anyone else?

It was just like the haunted houses I used to go to in high school.

But of course, the point of the cruise is to see the Three Gorges. On our cruise boat, we passed through the Three Gorges but we were able to also ride smaller boats to see the Three Little Gorges and in fact also rode even smaller boats to see the Three Mini Gorges. It was like those Russian dolls. But they were all so gorgeous. Its easy to see where all those dramatic Chinese paintings come from.

The first of the Three Gorges. We passed the others at 6am and I slept through those. Oops.

The Three Little Gorges. They were so tall and so majestic. It was also amazing to see them upclose.

Me and the guys on the mini boat to see the mini gorges. The guys stood out pretty easily and a lot of Chinese people wanted pictures of them but they took it in stride.

The gorges were very very tall. Even the mini ones.

The last big stop on the cruise was to see the Three Gorges Dam. The Yangzi is being dammed up to provide electricity and water but its going to flood a huge amount of the area, displacing over 200,000 people and flooding hundreds of historical sights. The dam is pretty much built and already at 150 meters or so. Everything was really beautiful, but I can only imagine what it all was like pre-dam. But the Chinese are very proud of the dam, which is the largest in the world. We took a tour of the dam and they really treat it like a spectacle. The dam even has logos and characters like Disneyland. Every stage of our tour brought us closer and closer to the dam. We stopped at first for a panoramic view, then again for a slightly closer view and so on until we finally got to the top of the dam itself. We even stopped at this really weird aquarium! The tour was like going to an amusement park but it was hilarious. We even had to go through intense security screening before going on top of the dam. We weren't allowed to bring anything with us, especially not tissues! Pieces of paper were okay but not tissues. You should have seen the pile of tissues they collected. What did they think we would do with them? Throw them into the river and clog the dam??

Already at 150 meters! But its not going to be completed until 2009.

The Big Dam. It was pretty impressive in how big it is but in the end it looked like a big slab of concrete.

Look at all the Chinese tourists! They built all these viewing points of the dam complete with characters, fountains and manicured lawns. They seemed to be more proud of the dam than anything else.

We had to cross the dam and crossed it through a series of locks. It took hours but it was pretty amazing to see.

Chinese tourists also enjoying the spectacle.

Overall, the cruise was so great. We had tons of time to sit and relax, reading and playing cards. It was interesting though to be on a Chinese tour boat where all the other tourists were Chinese. Our guides spoke very very little English and we spent most of the time confused as to what was going on. But the people I met on the boat were all so great so at least I wasn't alone. We drank many many beers and ate some pretty weird food but it was all worth it. And now I'm in Yangshao, a backpacker hangout in the South along the Li River. Its supposed to be beautiful here and very relaxing so I'm very excited to be here. I'm also glad to finally be in one spot since we spent the last 48-hours traveling pretty much non-stop. The 3 guys were also heading to Yangshao so at least I have company!

Some of the street stalls were pretty fancy. Yum! Though I shouted at Jamie as he ate an eel. And then he spat it out. It was kind of gross, actually. But the rest of the food was good.