China Part Three: Three Gorges

After 12 hours on a train and 4 1/2 hours on a bus we reached Yichang. Once in Yichang we took another bus 40 minutes and reached the Three Gorges Dam. Spanning over a mile in width Amy and I can now say we went on the longest dam tour in the world.

We then took another bus 40 minutes to board the beauty you see above to navigate the Yangtze River. To quote a British lady traveling on the same vessel "the bathrooms are hideous." You had to take showers at a certain time to have warm water (I didn't know this, so I got a cold shower). We didn't hear them before we went to bed, but there were rats scurrying all throughout the boat. Good thing we only had to stay one night on the Princess Cruise.

The next morning we docked, boarded a smaller river boat, and traveled up one of the gorges. Although the dam has made the waters rise about 30 meters, the gorges are still beautiful.

After an hour on this boat we boarded this small traditional fishing boat paddled by three local minorities. When the water became to shallow to row, they got out of the boat and pulled us by ropes. Apparently they used to do this part in the nude, but they now wear shorts.

We then headed back to the luxury liner (needless to say, after we heard the rats we spent the rest of our time on the top level of the boat enjoying the views of the gorges). We spent the night in a nice hotel and zoomed back up the river in a hydroplaning boat the next morning to a 16 hour overnight train.