An Extraordinarily Sketchy Day

Today began nicely in our beautiful hotel and we went up to breakfast and had some eggs and bacon and some yogurt.  Mom and I were told we had the morning off to pack for our “cruise” on the Yangtze river that we were going on starting this afternoon.  It took us about 2 hours to organize and re-pack things as we were told to bring just one bag each and then the rest of the luggage we would leave at the hotel in their storage area.  At about 10 am, dad bbm-ed us and said that we needed to be downstairs ready to go to lunch at 11:30am - well so much for our relaxing morning!  We finished packing quickly and went downstairs where we proceeded to wait for 25 minutes until someone came to pick us up.  We were then driven really quickly and scarily to the same place we had lunch yesterday and met some of the same head people and a few new ones.

The lunch today was also quite good though but I didn’t eat too much because I knew we were getting on a boat later and I didn’t want to not feel well.  After lunch we came back to the hotel and had about 20 minutes to get everything together and get downstairs.  We were planning on taking one piece of luggage each - our suitcases and we had a bellman come up and bring our stuff downstairs.  When we arrived in the lobby, the rest of our group was all ready to go and had stored their large pieces of luggage and were just bring small bags on the boat. Well no one informed us that we should bring small pieces on the boat and they then suggested we should spend five minutes and repack everything into our small carry-on’s.  What a nightmare.  We went back up to our room that we had already checked out of and it took 5 minutes for the bellman to “allow” us to go back into the room to repack and then we spent the next 20 minutes repacking as quickly as possible to make sure that we had everything that we needed.  We had no idea what type of boat we would be on so we didn’t know what to pack and so we took some liners a couple of shirts, camera gear and I brought my computer and then we were ready to go.  We then went back downstairs again, rechecked our bags for storage and then all checked our small bags because we were told we were then going on a walk around the park to see a bit of Yichang.  We walked out of the hotel then and were taken to the park next to the hotel that we proceeded to walk around, very slowly and some people went into the Walmart which was there (we did not) and then an hour later we walked back to the hotel.

We were then told to put our carry-on’s on a small bus that was at the hotel and we thought we would get onto the bus but then we were told we were walking to a restaurant to have a Western dinner- this was at 4pm.  No one was hungry but we were told to eat as there was no dinner on the boat.  The restaurant we walked to had a tiny door and then up the stairs opened a large eating area.  It was quite dark and we sat down and then were immediately asked what we wanted and that we had to order something that could be made quickly.  They suggested steaks as they think that is the only Western food we eat.  Yikes.  Mom got a steak and I ordered fried rice and dad had a bowl of fruit.  There was not much to choose from and it all looked disgusting.  We didn’t eat very much but we were told to take the leftovers with us for the boat for later.  After ‘dinner’ we walked back to the hotel and got right onto the bus that then we were informed was taking us to another public bus area because we had to take another bus to get to the boat.  Apparently the boat was supposed to pick us up in Yichang but there was something wrong with the locks in the dam and none of the boats could get there.  We are not really sure that was true, but we had no choice anyway.  We were dropped off at the bus area and our guide, who spoke English, found the bus we so we got off the mini-bus and boarded a very old, bus smelling of diesel.  Mom luckily got us seats up front so we wouldn’t get sick.  The bus driver was a very good driver and for the first time all trip I actually felt okay being in a vehicle here.  The bus ride was an hour and a half to the boat and we passed some nice scenery and then drove over a huge bridge and saw the hydroelectric dam- the largest in the world also known as the Three Gorges Dam.  It was huge and apparently we are going to see it closer on Saturday, though I was just fine seeing what we saw and don’t really have a desire to see more of it.  It displaced so many people and it doesn’t have a place for the fish to go through, so a certain number are bused to the other side of the dam every year.

We arrived at a dark building at which point we exited the bus and we walked into a building as they then turned on the lights so more people came into the building.  We waited for a bit and our guide said he bought us tickets to ride the cable car down to the docks.  A few minutes later we boarded this large tram car and it literally moved down the slope to the docks.  

We exited the old car and walked along the docks until we saw a few large boats all docked together.  We walked onto one boat that was really old and mom and I got very nervous and then we kept walking across this boat and onto another one and finally a third one which had a red carpet welcome sign and a tiny lobby.

 

Our guide checked us in and said our rooms were on the third floor.  I carried both mom’s and mine carry-on roller boards up the three flights of stairs and then we made our way down the old, sketchy, smelly hallway to our room.  We walked into the tiny room and immediately starting Clorox wiping the whole place.  It was disgusting and dirty and cold.  We are on a Chinese boat that is very sketchy.  We haven’t seen any rats yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there were some.

Everything is said in Chinese on the boat so we don’t understand anything and the 8 other people in our group are helpful when we are around them, but they all went into their rooms and I think went to bed immediately.  Our guide said that the whole boat wakes up at 6am to have breakfast at 6:30am and then we get off the boat for sightseeing at 7am…. Yikes!  This room is freezing and mom and I tried to get settled a bit and put our pj’s on- we have our scrubs tucked into our socks and our shirts tucked into our pants and we have bug spray on and our pressure point wrist bands and we both took a little Dramamine.   We started moving about 30 minutes after we boarded and we are moving quickly.  Our room luckily has a very large window, but our beds are basically sleeping on wood.  We were also given a ration of three water bottles for the trip (one for each day), a towel, some shampoo (which we will definitely not be using for a shower), and some toilet paper.  The bathroom was gross- mom cleaned it very well though. We are currently in bed full steam ahead and I believe we will be moving the whole night.  They seem to drive their boats like they drive, except they can’t stop the boats like the cars and the buses!  We are passing boats that are literally right next to us- it is very scary and hopefully we will survive these few days.

Today was dad's birthday and our thoughtful hosts ordered us a cake to take with us on the boat!