"1st Class"

For the rest of Chengdu, we saw the Giant Pandas at the National Breeding Center, enjoyed bottomless cups of Chrysanthemum and Jasmine tea (gave a shout out to Jesmine Choi), and toured a bizarre mechanical dinosaur dungeon for kids in a dank basement at the edge of People's Park. It was admittedly kinda scary when they would let out a pre-recorded roar, but the ferocity was, in the end, mitigated by the occasional decaying plaster and exposed steel rods.

Sarah got her funds transferred, finding the phone easier than the Internet. Go figure. And we booked a "1st Class" cabin aboard a boat to tour the Yangtze River and the Three-Gorges before the river is flooded in a couple of years from the massive new Three-Gorges dam in Yichang. The guy John we booked the tickets with said, "You know this is a Chinese tour don't you." "Yeah," we said, thinking it would of course be a little rough around the edges. Little did we know just how rough.

Took a bus from Chengdu to the concrete-riddled, hot-house of Chongqing (CHON-CHING), where our boat was leaving from. There wasn't much there (even the hot pots they are supposedly famous for were really hard to find and when we did were nothing special). Even the Chinese we talked to said even they hated Chongqing! It would also turn out that we were arriving on the hottest day they had in 50 years. Man, you talk about an oven, that place was crazy!

A guide was walking us to our boat and the one in front of us looked a little dinged, but we thought, 'ok, we can live with it.' Then he turned to the left and we saw our real boat. Pretty much a rusted hunk, that was trying to be salvaged as a tourist boat for its last few runs. And the first class room? Let's just say we didn't even want to think what 2nd class was like. The bathroom was dirty, floors missing tiles, a/c barely blowing a breeze. In hindsight, we would have carried our packs all the way up and demanded something else, but we had a back door trip through southern China already timed out with our Visa entry into Vietnam. And all the boats are supposed to be booked and so then we'd have to recheck into a hotel, and so on. Plus, they say you're supposed to see the boat before you buy the tickets, but what an enormous pain getting down to the dock in searing heat and you have to do it within the couple of hours you're leaving because the boats are continually rotating in and out. Even then, you can never be sure that the boat you bought the ticket for is the one you'll be on!

But then of course we thought this trip IS mostly about seeing the Yangtze and the Three Gorges, which didn't disappoint and were magnificent. But we definitely had a quick education of what a "Chinese tour" was. They also had funny little charges and fees for everything. 50 Yuan to go to the upper deck and cafe, which did have two huge air conditioners blasting. Attractions at each stop was all extra fees, and there were fees sometimes just to leave the boat. A deposit for your key. Even a deposit for the cheap, laminated paper ticket you had to pay 50 Yuan for in the first place. Apparently, they either couldn't build in the cost into the ticket price, or laminated printouts are quite expensive.



The first night was searing hot, so we couldn't wait to leave and get the air moving. When we did, we went up to the cafe to just sit in the blasting A/C for a few minutes, play some cards, bide our time to go back to the room and then silently pray.


The scenery was spectacular, however. Perhaps even the most spectacular was ironically the LITTLE Three Gorges. Named so because the passage is more narrow here, but the height of the cliffs is roughly the same, making for an even more dramatic juxtaposition. We also visited the Three-Gorges Dam, which is really only worth it just to stand in the middle on top of it while they are doing construction. The security is tighter than an airline, though. You can only bring a camera and a passport. We left everything else on the bus.

Later that night an enormous rain storm broke out with lighting flashing all around us and the two other Westerners we met on the boat, Tim and Sara from England. At about 10pm, our boat itself went through the locks, being lowered about 20m to the other side and finishing our journey. All in all it was a great trip, the magnificent scenery better than the experience.

The next day, we would begin a truly adventurous, "backdoor" journey through some really random places in southwest China, continuing to book it south and make it in time for our Visa entry into Vietnam.