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So Tracy is off shopping and I am left with the duty of writing the next step of the blog. As Tracy said last time we got up extremely early on day 6 for the hot air balloon ride and then left Yangshuo mid afternoon and traveled 3+ hours to Liuzhou to pick up our 18 hour train journey to Yi Chang to start the Yangzi River Cruise (aka Yangtze).
Yangzi River
To be fair the journey wasn't that bad. We started out late, around 9-10 pm, and were in soft sleepers (4 people to a carriage and it has a door, the hard sleepers have 6 people and no door!), slept for 9 hours or so, however the 6 hours after arrival into Yi Chang was a bit boring but bearable.
We arrived into to Yi Chang around 4pm on day 7 and after some dinner got on board our "palace on the seas" at around 8pm to head down the Yangzi river. This was no Bermuda cruise liner, but to be fair it wasn't too bad either. It had about 100 people on board (mostly dutch and polish, some Chinese) and it had a western toilet (as opposed to a squat on the train) which to the women in our group was heaven. The three nights on board were pretty decent, the food was mainly Chinese and the dutch were bearable, though the fights at food times in the restaurant (to get to the buffet) showed a lack of civility on all parts.
On the morning of Day 8 we arrived at the Three Gorges Dam, a massive hydroelectric damming and flood control project that is near finished. It's pretty monstrous in size, it has something like 25 turbines in it and the river rises from 65 meters above sea level on one side to 175 meters on the other. The dam project has been pretty controversial as it flooded hundreds of low lying villages on the high side of the dam, but it has stopped the old problems of massive flooding that occurred in the past and not to mention all that electricity now being created too! It seems from speaking to tour guides and locals that the younger generation are more in favor of the dam, whilst the older generation who have been displaced and remember the past more are more anti the dam. Either way over 1 million people were displaced and it took us 4 hours to pass the dam in five 'lock' stages each raising us approximately 20 meters. The three gorges the other side of the dam were extremely beautiful and impressive although the only down point for us was the weather, which was misty/cloudy a lot of the time. It would have been nice to have seen some sun whilst on the boat going through the gorges.
Traveling through the gorges was relaxing and gave you quite the perspective. There was us traveling through these massive natural canyons at 170 meters above sea level and yet they are actually hundreds of meters higher (now under water), it was like a scene out of an Indiana Jones or Lord of the Rings movie were you just think how miniscule and insignificant man is in the picture.
So the nights of day 7, 8 and 9 were spent on the Yangzi river and we disembarked around 10am on the morning of day 10 at Fengdu where we picked up a 3 hour bus to Chongqing where we were getting a train to Chengdu. As our train from Chongqing wasn't till 5.30pm and we had arrived at 1pm we decided to store our bags at the train station and head into to town centre for a little Szechuan lunch. Now Chongqing is one of those cites most of us has never heard off and why would we, it only has some 16 million people living in it, incredible, one of the biggest cities on the planet and I'd never heard of it. Though we were only in Chongqing a few hours a few things happened. We had had probably the hottest dam lunch and food I have ever had, Szechuan food has a reputation in China for being extremely spicy and I can tell you as a man who loves his hot spicy food it lives up to that reputation, I thought it was magnificent.
Another thing that happened was that our tour leader had caught the news (and it made BBC news too) and told us that 4 people (dutch) had been killed in a hot air balloon accident in Yangshou, (this freaked a few people out in our tour as we had been there in a hot air balloon only 4 days earlier), very sad. The other thing that happened was that, like a lot of big cities, Chongqing at around 4pm is the start of rush hour and we couldn't get a cab for love nor money, so we had to take the bus. We got of the bus and arrived at the train station with 5 to spare before the train left and we still had to get our luggage and and clear security. To say it was a mad dash and a panic from the bus is an understatement and was probably the only time I've seen our tour leader flustered. Anyway we made it, just, and on we went to Chengdu and the Panda's.
Chengdu
Very cool and beautiful place I thought and the original home of our tour guide. We were only here two nights and on the first we sampled the famous 'Hot Pot' (this after the very spicy lunch in Chongqing only 6 hours or so earlier). For the lack of a better explanation the hot pot looks like a massive boiling wok of Chilli soup and you can decide how spicy you want it. The staff serve you whatever uncooked meat and vegetables you want and you cook it for as long or short as you like in the Chilli soup. Excellent again I thought. We went for the very spicy and by the next morning quite a few people on the tour were paying the price on the toilet seat, but not yours truly. Not a good start though for the panda tour!
So off we trek for 30 mins or so (in the bus) the next morning in Chengdu to the Panda reserve (day 11 now) and we saw well... Pandas. For the women out there, including Tracy, this was a big highlight and yeah they were cool. We saw Pandas of all ages from a few days old to a few months old to years old. Interesting I thought that a panda is born with no fur and no bigger than rat (and looks like one to - seriously), so only a couple of pounds in weight, but after two weeks it starts to grow fur and by a couple of months it now looks like a panda and is well over a 14 pounds in weight. By the age of 12 months the panda is pretty damn big and about 70 pounds or so in weight, amazing growth spurt, but I guess they only live 20-25 human years so not much in that consideration.
The reserve had about 100 pandas in it and we were lucky enough to see quite a few of them and learn about their history and their near extinction state, we even saw some being fed milk which I guess was pretty cool. They also had red pandas there, yes red pandas. They are a cross between a panda and a racoon apparently, but this does them a disservice as I have seen racoons and they are not cute and nice at all. These pandas only grow to the size of a small dog or a bit bigger than the average cat, but very nice all the same and for the equivalent of £10 you could hold one for 10-20 seconds or so, so Tracy and few girls did. The black and white pandas you weren't allowed to hold, only sit beside them and this cost the equivalent of £100 for the same amount of time, a couple of people in our group did it but not us. We left the pandas in the early afternoon and visited a Buddhist mosque and had a vegetarian lunch (a welcome break for some people's internal systems I think).
That evening in Chengdu was spent at a show recommended to us by our guide. It was like a variety show but in an old Chinese tea house, very cool. The show had a guy playing an erhu (chinese violin) who was pretty good, a shadow puppet show, again pretty entertaining, but the highlights were the hand shadow show (a guy making the impression of birds flying and horses running etc with his hands, very impressive this) and a changing faces show (this I thought was the best) which I can only explain as performers on stage wearing masks (like full face mascaraed ball masks) and changing them to a different mask in the blink of an eye. I can't stress enough how fast and impressive this was. I am sure it is on You Tube and I would recommend you take a look, "Changing Faces and Spitting Fire". After the show we all went for pizza. I think the previous day of spicy food was still all too much for some and a bit of western food was required. The following morning was a 5am wake up call for the bus to the airport and the flight to Shanghai.
Shanghai
Day 12 now and a quick and uneventful 2 hour flight to Shanghai saw us arriving around 11am and taking the worlds fastest train 'The Maglev' into Shanghai city. Very impressive this, apparently it can go above 400kph. We saw it at over 300kph and that seemed damn fast, looking out the window, seeing us wiz by cars and towns was incredible and then looking at the other train tracks and not actually seeing any but magnetic lines in the ground made me marvel at the ingenuity of the system.
Shanghai, a former British colonial port and city, is now a very thriving Chinese mecca. There were building works going on all over the place for the 2010 Expo and I can imagine by the size of the works that it is going to be another Chinese show piece (I say another thinking of the Beijing Olympics last year). Over the course of the 4 days and nights we were in Shanghai we visited The Bund (like an embankment). I found it quite strange looking at one side of the river and seeing 30+ big British colonial style buildings that were once banks and custom houses (now all listed buildings and Chinese banks), but which looked like buildings you would see in the centre of London at Mayfair or something like that, whilst on the other side the Chinese Financial and shopping centre, housing many modern sky scrapers including 'The Pearl' building and the new financial centre building (which I think is the worlds third tallest building).
During our time in Shanghai we did relax quite a bit but we managed to visit the French Concession area, which is basically a lots streets all nicely lined with trees. The buildings are all in a French art deco style, which are now mainly little boudoir style shops and restaurants and the whole area was really quite quaint. No idea however how the French managed to seize this area and put their french style on it during the British colonial period, interestingly enough this is where the Communist party in China began, ironically really right under the noses of the colonial British and French.
We also visited the 'Old City' which was the only part of Shanghai which China still manged to rule whilst the British were in control. It was quite the area, the buildings were densely packed in and quite old and run down, however within in it was Yuyuan Bazaar and gardens area. To say the bazaar area was pandemonium and chaos is an understatement, it was full of Chinese tourists and shops, however right in the heart of it was the Yuyuan gardens which can only be described as beautiful. They were created many years ago (16th century) by the owner who spent 20 years building them and 40 Yuan fee charged to enter them manages to keep the majority of the tourists at bay and looking pretty. It really was quite something seeing this lovely surreal gardens containing beautiful trees and rockeries and right outside the chaos of the Bazaar.
One evening we went to see the Shanghai acrobats, which were pretty good, but personally I thought the show in Chengdu was better. The highlight for me was seeing 5 motorbikes racing round the inside of a sphere shaped cage (and this cage was pretty damn small) how they managed to get five motor bikes in all going round in circles and not hit each other was amazing.
Shanghai I thought was great, a very big and pretty city and getting very modern very fast, if only I spoke mandarin or the locals spoke a bit more English, I think it would have potential as a place for Tracy and I to ultimately settle, but alas I do not and neither do they, so the search continues.
On Day 16 of the tour in Shanghai we said goodbye to Aussie Tom and his girlfriend Alex (hopefully we shall see them in Brisbane) and also our Detroit John and Oxford Tom and picked up another Aussie couple Dave and his wife Terry, another Aussie called Shane and a couple of Swiss lads called Daniel and Beat (yes BEAT). Later this day we all boarded the train at Shanghai for our marathon 18 hour overnight epic train journey to Luoyang (and this time on the hard sleepers) before a two hour bus journey to the home of Kung Fu, Shaolin.
Shaolin
So the train journey was crap to say the least, the hard sleepers were packed and we were right by the carriage door which didn't help as the millions of Chinese that were on the train decided to have a massive con-flab right outside the door during the night and smoke numerous packets of cigarettes, the combination continuously wafting in the door keeping us awake and feeling sick. 11am the next day didn't come soon enough and I think everyone was glad to get off the train and on the bus to Shaolin. On route we stopped for lunch and just as we entered Shaolin saw thousands and thousands of trainee kung fu monks all wearing red t-shirts running down the road. It was quite the sight to see, apparently there are some 70,000 trainees in Shaolin right now at the Kung Fu schools.
So no sooner had we arrived than we were whisked off to see a Kung Fu show which was pretty good and then a tour of the Shaolin Temple. The temple was pretty sizable, but knowing that it had been pretty much destroyed by a civil war fire in the 1920's and rebuilt in the old style kind of took the edge off, that and maybe the fact that the accountants have got hold of the temple and are charging 100 Yuan to visit it now left me with the feeling that it has lost a little of its serenity in favor of attaining the western tourists and the money they bring.
Our hotel was only a mile away from the temple and was very nice, the surrounding area of the rolling hills and greenery was very relaxing. Unfortunately it couldn't last at and 8.30am the next morning the Kung Fu lesson began, day 18 of the tour now by the way. I wasn't feeling the best (Cold) so sat this one out, but Tracy and the others all gave it their best being taught by a 70 year old master and his young apprentice, almost Karate Kid and Mr. Miyagi like. Quite amusing to watch I thought, I am sure I am biased but I thought Tracy was the best, but this could have something to do with the fact she once did Taekwando to the level of black belt. At the end of the lesson the apprentice did a little routine for all to watch and this was damn impressive and showed the gap between the tour group and the apprentice level. Later that day we visited some pagoda's in the grounds of the Shaolin temple and took a cable car ride that was OK but not that impressive, I think the most impressive thing that day was that Jackie Chan was in town to sign an agreement to shoot his new film the aptly named “The Shaolin Temple”, I didn't see him personally but it did cause a bit a pandemonium amongst the usually calm monk students.
We left later that afternoon to head back to Luoyang stopping at the Longmen Grottos taking in the thousand plus Buddha's all carved into the stone some 1300 years ago. Very impressive viewing, I wonder if we could do it today let alone a thousand years ago. That night we ate a local restaurant and tried the 'water buffet banquet' which was very good. It was loads of dishes of noodles and vegetables in soup style broths and to top it off we had a bottle of Chinese liquor, which was the start of the downfall for many. The Swiss boys had bought a bottle of Johnny Walker Red label with them and insisted on not taking it the next day to Xian, so some us only felt it right at near midnight to assist them with the consumption of the whiskey. The next morning getting up at 7am for the 10am train to Xian I felt like $h*t but soon felt better seeing some of the others especially James and Beat who looked like death. The 6 hour train journey from Luoyang to Xian on very old style train was a real challenge for most, conversation was at it highest and the two aforementioned boys visited the toilet more than once to be sick (apparently it was all motion sickness, yeah right!). By around 3pm or so on day 19 of the tour we arrived into Xian.
We've just arrived in Zhongwei from Xian but Tracy will continue the blog in Beijing which is our last stop on our China tour.
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