China - Yangtze River and The Three Gorges Dam

From Yangshuo we went back by bus ti Guilin and then boarded another night train to WuChan. Another 15 hours on a train with very little sleep. But there was no rest when we arrived, no, we boarded another bus to YiChang. In YiChang we stopped for a quick lunch, went shopping and then headed to the "Three Gorges Dam". It is an amazing achievement of engineering, however I am not sure how environmentally meaning full this building is. It almost seems that especially because there was so much critique from the West, that the Chinese government was pushing even harder to make it happen. Official numbers state 1 Million people that had to be relocated, my guess would be many more. Entire cities have been erased and the rebuilt on the hillsides, high enough to be outside the reach of the rising waters. These new cities have been built for purpose not beauty ....and it shows.

In front of the dam .... there was even a little hint of sun to be seen on the horizon. Hard to believe that the wall in the background is 185 meters tall and over 2000 meters wide.





One of the two double ship locks that will enable traffic of large vessel "around" the dam. The process can take up to 4 hours.





They even build an "elevator" to speed up the time to pass the dam, especially for charter boats. This "elevator: is built by a German company and will transport ships up and down in 45 minutes.


Our boat for the cruise on the Yangtze. Don't get fooled by the photo, it was much less luxurious than you would think.





The cruise reminded me a lot of the trip in Southern Chile. The "Gorges" a quite narrow, with high, steep hills on both sides. There was not much traffic, so it was actually quite peaceful.

One of the few remaining traditional Chines houses in the Yangtze Valley .... soon this will be gone to when the water level is raised one final time.

These small boats had been the major means of transportation for a long time. Farmers spent hours on the river to get to and from the market.

We did an excursion on these small boats into a side arm of the Yangtze. At times the water was so shallow that the boats had to be pulled by men. In the past the water of the Yangtze was very shallow and it was the job of the locals to pull the boats for money. Until not very long ago they performed this task butt naked.



Just loved the colors and reflections in the water.

More reflexions ....

A cargo ship taking on coal that has been mined in the mountains. In the background you can see shoots along the road. Trucks dump their load here and then the coal is sliding down the shoot into a pipe and into the cargo hold of the ship.

One of the new cities that have been built to house the displaced. As you can see all the buildings are very functional, they are build into the hillsides which required major effort to stabilize the hill sides to prevent land slides.

Another new city .... in the middle you can see parts of the old city wall with the gate. The wall and gate have been moved up from their original location to be saved from the floods.