Today started with another optional tour - this time to the
White Emperor City. Once again, I passed on this tour and decided to stick to
my 'lazy river' theme instead. My morning consisted of breadkaft, nap, a little
reading, another nap, and a little more reading.
Towards late morning, we entered the first of 3 gorges. The scenery was breathtaking! We were passing through sheer cliffs and steep mountains that were lush and green with spring growth. It seemed that we had a more beautiful view around every bend.
The afternoon brought us into another gorge - just as beautiful as the first, but this one offered a bonus. We were able to take an off-ship excursion to travel up one of the smaller tributaries of the Yangtze River. We transferred to smaller, glass enclosed boats for a trip up the Goddess Stream. Our local guide on the boat was Sunny and she was delightful! She taught herself English by watching American TV! She had a lot of personality and was able to share a lot about the area with us. Many of the local people living in the area were relocated due to the Three Gorges Dam project, but she stayed in her village which has about 100 people and is located on the side of the mountain.
She (and her fellow guides) sang some local folk songs for us, and managed to get about 20 of the tourists (including me) into a conga-style dance line! It was a very fun and light hearted excursion.
We had the Captain's Farewell banquet for dinner and it was amazing! They just kept bringing food - soup, vegetables, rice, chicken, fish, pork, beef, duck and finished off with fruit. After dinner, the boat staff put on a Caberet show. It was a nice mix of singing, dancing, magic and comedy. At the end, they started playing group dance songs like at wedding receptions in the US and several people got up and joined them. I decided to pass on that dance party and headed off to bed instead.
Towards late morning, we entered the first of 3 gorges. The scenery was breathtaking! We were passing through sheer cliffs and steep mountains that were lush and green with spring growth. It seemed that we had a more beautiful view around every bend.
The afternoon brought us into another gorge - just as beautiful as the first, but this one offered a bonus. We were able to take an off-ship excursion to travel up one of the smaller tributaries of the Yangtze River. We transferred to smaller, glass enclosed boats for a trip up the Goddess Stream. Our local guide on the boat was Sunny and she was delightful! She taught herself English by watching American TV! She had a lot of personality and was able to share a lot about the area with us. Many of the local people living in the area were relocated due to the Three Gorges Dam project, but she stayed in her village which has about 100 people and is located on the side of the mountain.
She (and her fellow guides) sang some local folk songs for us, and managed to get about 20 of the tourists (including me) into a conga-style dance line! It was a very fun and light hearted excursion.
We had the Captain's Farewell banquet for dinner and it was amazing! They just kept bringing food - soup, vegetables, rice, chicken, fish, pork, beef, duck and finished off with fruit. After dinner, the boat staff put on a Caberet show. It was a nice mix of singing, dancing, magic and comedy. At the end, they started playing group dance songs like at wedding receptions in the US and several people got up and joined them. I decided to pass on that dance party and headed off to bed instead.
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