Three Gorges
Are gorgeous! Haha..actually not anymore. I went there in 2000 before the water level rose and it was much nicer, in a lot of respects. Before you could see the paths in the rock where the people pulled the boats up the river. Along the path there were also Chinese characters written in the rock. All of that is submerged now. The cities which used to line the river are also underwater (probably dismantled first). I remember in 2000, when you saw a city along the river, you could look up and see the signs in the hills marking the future water levels, and at the very top the spanking new city they had built for the residents of the city below. All that's left now is a city which doesn't even look very far up. As for the actual gorges, I'm not sure the water level difference has changed it noticeably, though one of the guides says the water level has risen 30 meters. I think you can now go further in the Little Three Gorges to what's called the Mini Three Gorges. I don't remember going to those parts before, but my memory is a bit hazy.
Another big difference was last time we went on a foreigner boat (I didn't even realize it then) which is worth the money you pay for it, unlike most things geared towards foreigners in China. The foreigner boat is bigger and cleaner, and has a sitting toilet and hot showers. Our boat this time had limited hot water and a shower over our very smelly squatting toilet. Obviously being a regular boat, there were a lot of Chinese people on the boat. This is all fine and good but it means there is a lot of smoking on the boat too. It also means we get to see a lot of littering. Littering seems fairly acceptable in China. On buses people just open the window and throw out their take-out cartons and whatever else they feel like. You see litter all over the roads, but there are plenty of people cleaning it up (job creation and all). Unfortunately, it's not as easy to clean up a river as it is to clean up a street. We saw all sorts of things getting thrown overboard. Barry was enjoying the morning view of the Yangtze when suddenly two bowls of instant noodles in a plastic bag flew by his view into the river. After we finished playing cards, the game room attendent helped us clean up by throwing our plastic cups out the window. On the balcony, a man was nice enough to try to clean up the trash he dropped on the floor of the boat by just throwing it off the boat. There were trash cans on the boat but not many people seemed to use them. Who knows though, maybe those just get emptied into the river too.
Anyhow part of the package we paid for was a tour guide who would come get us whenever something interesting was happening. She introduced herself the first night and told us important things like to close our windows at night and not to play cards or mahjong with anyone we didn't know. (Of course, first thing the following morning, a man knocked on our door asking if we would like to play mahjong.) We were probably a big headache for our tour guide since we didn't prepurchase the entrance tickets for any of the stops (they were boring) but we would always get off the boat without telling her and she would have to make sure we were back. At the last stop at the Three Gorges Dam, she specifically warned twice not to get off the boat. So right after she tells us not to get off the boat, we go into our room and hurriedly put on all our coats and run back out. Not off the boat, duh, just to the front balcony of the boat. But good thing she didn't see us, or she probably would have blown a gasket. Going through the dam was the best part. The locks are huge. Actually I've never been through any locks, so I don't know the normal size, but these locks would fit about 6 boats of our size comfortably. We got in at least 7 because they managed to squeeze in 3 boats in the front: our boat, another cruise boat, and a coal barge. It's kind of fun when the water begins to sink. You see this icky green goo on the walls at the initial water level. The process does get a bit old after the first time though. We went to sleep after entering the second lock (about midnight) but woke up to see us emerge from the last lock. We were hoping to see the high wall of the dam, but it looks like the locks send you a bit away from the dam and you're separated from it by an artificial island.
I'm not sure if I would recommend this cruise to anyone now. It's still quite pretty, especially the small gorges. If you do choose to go, buy tickets on the foreigner boat.
Another big difference was last time we went on a foreigner boat (I didn't even realize it then) which is worth the money you pay for it, unlike most things geared towards foreigners in China. The foreigner boat is bigger and cleaner, and has a sitting toilet and hot showers. Our boat this time had limited hot water and a shower over our very smelly squatting toilet. Obviously being a regular boat, there were a lot of Chinese people on the boat. This is all fine and good but it means there is a lot of smoking on the boat too. It also means we get to see a lot of littering. Littering seems fairly acceptable in China. On buses people just open the window and throw out their take-out cartons and whatever else they feel like. You see litter all over the roads, but there are plenty of people cleaning it up (job creation and all). Unfortunately, it's not as easy to clean up a river as it is to clean up a street. We saw all sorts of things getting thrown overboard. Barry was enjoying the morning view of the Yangtze when suddenly two bowls of instant noodles in a plastic bag flew by his view into the river. After we finished playing cards, the game room attendent helped us clean up by throwing our plastic cups out the window. On the balcony, a man was nice enough to try to clean up the trash he dropped on the floor of the boat by just throwing it off the boat. There were trash cans on the boat but not many people seemed to use them. Who knows though, maybe those just get emptied into the river too.
Anyhow part of the package we paid for was a tour guide who would come get us whenever something interesting was happening. She introduced herself the first night and told us important things like to close our windows at night and not to play cards or mahjong with anyone we didn't know. (Of course, first thing the following morning, a man knocked on our door asking if we would like to play mahjong.) We were probably a big headache for our tour guide since we didn't prepurchase the entrance tickets for any of the stops (they were boring) but we would always get off the boat without telling her and she would have to make sure we were back. At the last stop at the Three Gorges Dam, she specifically warned twice not to get off the boat. So right after she tells us not to get off the boat, we go into our room and hurriedly put on all our coats and run back out. Not off the boat, duh, just to the front balcony of the boat. But good thing she didn't see us, or she probably would have blown a gasket. Going through the dam was the best part. The locks are huge. Actually I've never been through any locks, so I don't know the normal size, but these locks would fit about 6 boats of our size comfortably. We got in at least 7 because they managed to squeeze in 3 boats in the front: our boat, another cruise boat, and a coal barge. It's kind of fun when the water begins to sink. You see this icky green goo on the walls at the initial water level. The process does get a bit old after the first time though. We went to sleep after entering the second lock (about midnight) but woke up to see us emerge from the last lock. We were hoping to see the high wall of the dam, but it looks like the locks send you a bit away from the dam and you're separated from it by an artificial island.
I'm not sure if I would recommend this cruise to anyone now. It's still quite pretty, especially the small gorges. If you do choose to go, buy tickets on the foreigner boat.
posted by wchien at 3:12 PM
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