The Three Gorges Project has changed the Yangtze (or Chang Jiang in Chinese) in incredible ways. This cruise what not what I read about 15 or 20 years ago, on a sleepy ship traversing the huge gorges on swift water. The water was smooth the entire way (we were really cruising on the lake created by the dam). What it has done is opened up the waterway to much more commercial traffic and I was able to experience an incredible blend of old and new China.
One interesting aspect to the cruise is all the towns have a similar look. The relocation phase of the Three Gorges Project migrated 1.3 million people a hundred meters up the hillsides in about a decade. The construction is still going on - it was hard to find a vista without a crane in the picture when near the resettlement cities.
The ship (Chang Jiang Golden #1) itself was a mini version of the ship I sailed with NCL a couple of years ago, except for the incredibly hard working staff. I needed some AAA batteries to power my mouse and these two nice ladies must have ran the length of the ship several times until they got exactly what I needed - they wouldn't take "don't worry about it for an answer".
The ship had a nice dining hall, a lounge where the one Internet table was located and a nice sundeck. It held 350 passengers and 150 crew for a total of 500. There were 9 westerners on board for this cruise, which made it quite interesting.
Finally, I had brought along my huge portrait lens, but the vistas were so grand that I never used it. (I only made the mistake of asking Vicky to carry it with us once, but that was up the Ghost City stairs - big mistake.) So I broke it out on the last evening to take some shots.
Vicky posed at the sundeck railing, and then took a photo of me with the onboard artist (holding my one souvenir so far - a print of Baidi town & the first gorge).
Tiger & Brandon hammed it up for the camera a bit...
Finally, Xiao Ling, Huang Yi, and Zhe Shi posed for their final photos. We gave Zhe Shi the western name "Max" or "Maxwell" at a dinner right after the cruise and before the Three Gorges Dam tour.
(I don't know if told you but Huang Yi cut his finger during the fishing trip - hospital, stitches, etc. It seems to have healed well.)
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