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| I picked my way along an arrangement of planks, laid across rusty floating pontoons; all secured against the strong flow of the river by a chaotic tangle of wires and cargo nets. My scruffy demeanour and backpack did not do justice to the scene. A row of crew stood to attention and saluted as I approached the ship, to the sound of distorting classical music, played at the usual ear-splitting volume. I felt I should be wearing a Panama and white suit, with a string of porters following on, carrying my tatty leather suitcases, and perhaps my personal mahogany furniture, without which I would never travel. Back in reality, as I boarded I was hurriedly directed aft, where I could board my, much smaller a scruffier ship. I noticed that the real reason for the saluting crew was that the captain, indeed with a white suit and a porter, had been following me across the pontoons. Still, I had enjoyed the grand arrival for my cheap second-class ticket. My rusty, dented ship might not be pretty, but she is as comfortable as the crew are friendly. I had screwed down what I considered to be a great deal, Y460 for three nights and just under three days, to cruise some 800km down stream, terminating at the Three Gorges Dam near Yichang. Curiously, this trip is not popular with independent travellers. I met only a few at either end, and none on my boat. The Three Gorges has a reputation of being expensive, and it seems many rule it out of their itinerary. However, I had decided it would be my “treat” for China; though ultimately I think you will agree, the price is very reasonable indeed. So it would be, that packed onto a boat with about four-hundred others, I would see far more than just the Yangzi River – I was about to experience the Chinese people on holiday. |
| You are what you eat?
I spent a few days soaking up the buzzing atmosphere around town, and sampling the incredibly fiery hot pot (huoguo), a local favourite. In fact, all the food in this region is hot enough to take your breath away. Each individual region and province in China has a very different cuisine, getting out onto the street to try them is time well spent. I am not quite sure how it happened, for I surely ought to know better by now; I was quite hungry, and up until now had not come across anything that took my fancy. After a bit of banter with some locals outside their restaurant, somehow I found myself sat at a table with an amused audience, as I picked my way through a large bowl of Duck tongues and a single Goose head. I have been in this situation before – when everyone stops to watch, and you have to smile, hold your breath and just get on with it – always have a drink handy to wash down those stubborn bits of cartilage. The thing with duck tongues is that they actually have very little meat on them. The rough surface of the tongue scratch’s your throat; the two little muscles and voice box are tough as old boots. |
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| Journal - |
| November 10 th, 2006 > a holiday with the locals |
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| After that epic hard-seat journey, I only had one thing on my mind when I arrived in Chungqing (pronounced Chung-Ching) – and it did not involve booking tickets for river cruises – or anything else other than sleep.
The travel agent, whose office I ended up in, after being stitched up by the staff at Shuyaun (I moaned about that place last journal too), was left in no doubt as to how I was feeling. I insisted he pay for a taxi to where I had originally intended on going, which he did. The staff from the above-mentioned hostel in Xi’an had recommended a “great place” to stay here, and with there being little in the way of budget accommodation available, I followed their advice. As they promised, I was met at the station (not my usual style, but doesn’t hurt once in a while), but rather than being taken to a hostel as expected, I ended up eyeballing John, a travel agent who very much wants to sell me a Yangzi River cruise. I put things straight pretty quickly. Timo is not at his best when he has not slept for twenty-four hours. I normally decide if I like a place quite soon after arriving – and it was love at first sight in Chungqing. Though a thousand kilometres from the nearest sea, the mountainous terrain reminds me of Hong Kong, a favourite haunt of mine. For a city so far inland, it actually has a strong maritime culture, due to its location on a peninsular between the mighty Yangzi and Jialing Rivers. And that, is essentially the main reason I have come here; to ride a boat down the Yangzi. It is just bad luck for John that I did not want to do it the very moment I arrived. |
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| check out the country profiles below - they took ages to write! |
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| So what does it cost in China? |
| The Chinese currency is the Renminbi (RMB). It is divided into ten yuan, which is again divided into ten jiao, the latter having so little value it is rarely used. EXCHANGE RATES GBP 1 - 14.6 RMB USD 1 - 7.9 RMB EUR 1 - 9.8 RMB check latest here Typical daily costs are now around Y20 p/n accommodation. A 630ml bottle of Tsing Tao beer (good) will cost a staggering Y2 (yes, that is true). Bottle of spring water - Y5 Full meal in local eatery Y10 - 20 A local bus ride Y3 Internet use, per hour Y2 I am living well on Y100 per day, obviously this goes up with travel and attractions. |
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| Meanwhile...back to the boat... |
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| Chungwhat? |
| The Dam - whats all the fuss about? |
| Honestly... this is how they appeared! |
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| Donald was speechless (as were twenty or so of his fellow Ducks), and less than impressed with my choice of food! |
| And the Goose head? That is a different proposition altogether. It had been split open with a cleaver to facilitate better access. It felt more like a biology lesson than a meal. I poked around for some time, the brains offering the only safe refuge in a sea of bone and sinew. I deduced that you would need many heads to eat your fill, and left just as hungry as when I had arrived. From now on, I am strictly a “breast and leg” man. |
| I like to say it over and again, for in my humble opinion Chungching is the most Chinese sounding of all cities. It rolls off the tongue beautifully (unless you happen to be a duck, then it is probably a sore subject) and sounds very cool. Chungqing is one of the country’s largest cities, the most industrial in the southwest and among the most polluted and populated. It sits awkwardly on the map as a “special municipality” rather than a province in its own right, and its thirty-one million folk squeeze in to an area of just 82,000 square kilometres. Comparison – Chungqing Municipality, 378 people per sq km, New Zealand – 14 people per sq km! The area is expected to be a key player as a gateway to the developing “wild west”, part of the grand plan, enabled by the Three Gorges Dam project, to shift more industrial production out into the backward western provinces. |
| This bustling, friendly city has a modern central business district, though still retains the charm of a previous era. There is always a narrow backstreet to explore, with old houses where the majority of folk still live. Most notable are the armies of men, and women, who deliver the cargo. The steep narrow streets are not accessible by motor vehicle, and porters, strung on bamboo poles across their backs, move everything from produce to furniture about. It is obvious that the weights are very heavy, and these people look incredibly fit. |
| A Royal welcome to the Yangzi |
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| Of the many ships of all sizes in port, most tend to start the trip late evening. On this night, I counted four preparing to sail, and from my vantage point on the river, Chungqing seemed ready to explode with excitement in a razzmatazz of noise and flashing neon. Darkness enveloped our ship, and the bright city lights faded away to just the occasional small village, dotted along the dark riverbanks. I moved inside to meet my cabin mates |
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| Though compact, the four birth/second class cabin was clean and cosy. This would be my home for the next three nights, along with three very friendly middle-aged men from Hunan province, in the northwest. My research for this trip revealed one thing especially; that is, that when the Chinese take a holiday, they tend to do it noisily with much beer, food and gambling. For this reason, taking a shared cabin can be something of a gamble, and you could potentially be kept awake all night observing a drunken, vociferous game of cards through a fug cigarette smoke. In the event however, my people were almost too quiet, in bed by ten every night, but probably the lesser of the two evils. In a similar fashion to my ride on the Trans-Siberian railway, I slipped into a relaxed routine of eating, reading, taking photographs and chatting with the locals. Of course, there is the added advantage of truly being able to walk around, and there is much to see as we move downriver. The first twenty-four hours, in terms of scenery, is pleasant but not particularly remarkable. The river is probably a kilometre wide, banked by forested hills and much industrial activity. A weird and wonderful assortment of boats plies the waterway, from tiny rafts up to medium sized cargo vessels. Our own ship docked several times, allowing time to explore nearby sites of interest; though I rarely bothered. I have seen plenty of temples for now, and did not much fancy being in a scrum with 399 fellow passengers. The boat crew are generally friendly, and very hard working, though on my particular trip there was not any English to go around. There seems to be no limit on where you can wonder, and I nosed around the engines rooms, the galley and the crew accommodation area. |
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| The Yangzi is China’s longest river; at 6,300 km, it is also the third longest in the world. From its source in the northwest province of Qinghai, it gathers volume through Tibet, before following a course eastward through seven other provinces, emptying into the East China Sea near Shanghai. The river is the main artery through the country and, amazingly, over 70% of China’s trade is moved along it. Its waters irrigate regions the size of France, and generate increasing volumes of electricity. However, an uneasy partnership does, from time to time, end in disaster. In the past century alone, over one million people have perished in its floodwaters. |
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| The infamous Three Gorges Dam, nearing its completion date of 2009, can claim many “most of” titles. It is the largest and most ambitious construction project in history. The country’s attempt to finally reign supreme over the river, will back up its waters and create the world’s biggest man-made lake, 550km in length. The deepened water upstream will improve navigation to further reaches and mineral resources, as it gradually displaces an estimated two million homes, and the dam will provide improved flood control through the densely populated regions of central China. The 2km long hydroelectric plant will have the capacity to generate the equivalent of eighteen nuclear power stations. |
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| Err... honey, did you leave the bath tap running? Not much chance of this house owner forgetting to move, is there? |
| The project, costing something like US$75 billion, may well bring many advantages, but as with all things, there will be a cost, in more than just dollars. In 1999, one hundred major cracks were discovered in the upstream face of the dam. The engineers claim to be on top of things, and partial filling to 127m was completed in 2003. It is estimated that should the dam give way, the massive volume of water would wipe out the four million strong population of Yichang within the hour. The environmental implications are not yet fully understood, but it is expected to put greater strain on the already endangered Yangzi River Dolphin and the Chinese Sturgeon. Most unpredictably, the dam will cause the river to slow, reducing its ability to oxygenate. This may introduce a wealth of new concerns over health and pollution for the millions of people that live along its banks. Numerous cities and industrial sites currently discharge their untreated waste into its waters, but it is diluted and carried away quickly by the flow. |
| By the second day, we passed into much more spectacular scenery. The river narrows, and the mountains gradually begin to close in. The most picturesque parts are actually three (not surprisingly, given the name) separate gorges named Qutang (8km), Wu (40km) and Xiling (80km). There is no definite point at which they begin or end, for the entire 200km stretch of river is banked by mountain, just some taller and narrower than others. For an extra Y150, I shifted to a smaller boat for a six-hour trip up the Little Three Gorges, to reach places where the ship cannot go. The sheer limestone cliffs climb nearly one thousand metres straight up into the sky, and at less than a hundred metres wide, this is were all your coffee table book pictures come from. Without any doubt, this is the most memorable part of a Yangzi trip, and is worth the extra cost. |
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| Continuing through the final, and longest, Xiling gorge, I tried to relax over a quiet beer in the social area on the forward deck. I say social area rather than bar purposely, for it is really just that. A room of plastic chairs and tables, where folk bring their own beer and food. Relaxing was totally out of the question; locals in their pyjamas played card games, chucked food around and belted out bad karaoke, as indeed is the norm here. They were all very friendly and much fun, but there is only so far you can take this thing. On the final morning, after much confusion, I deduced that the ship now does not reach Yichang at all, and stops at a small town, the name of which I guess I will never know, just short of the dam. I was under the impression (and quite excited at the prospect) that we would go through the massive locks in the dam, but it was not to be. When literally everyone else had left the ship, I sat tight in my cabin, assuming (though I admit, things were not looking good, with them all carrying their luggage) that they were just going out on some excursion. The little cleaning girl was beside herself with panic, when she strolled in to my cabin, to find an unshaven western brute still in there; she said I must leave the ship now. So very reluctantly, because I was very comfortable in there, I did – and that was the end of my ride down the Yangzi. |
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| I assume you have all heard of the Yangzi River, the Three Gorges and the controversial dam project. The latter in particular, has had a lot of press over the years. The common thing you will read, or hear, is “must cruise the Yangzi now, while it is still there”. But you know, now I have, I am not so sure that is altogether correct. Certainly, it will become a little less spectacular, the river wider and the mountains lower, and calmer water. Nevertheless, I see no reason why people will not still cruise up or down on the water. In any case, the Chinese will find a way to keep things going – my vote is Scuba dive the Three Gorges or submarine trips through the gorges. Only time will tell. |
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| I was keen to get back on to my southerly course, after a quick peek at the offending dam that stopped my trip prematurely. So I had a marathon period of travelling, hotfooting it from Yichang to Wuhan, a quick overnight there before hopping aboard a night train to Guilin in the southwest. You will be pleased to know, I took a hard sleeper this time. Don’t forget to keep an eye on WanderYears EXTRA! I updated it recently, with images of the Terracotta Warriors, and any moment now will do so again with some from the above-mentioned gorges. Coming soon on WY – eye-popping scenery from former hippy-hangout, Yangshuo. |
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