Wednesday, 21 September 2016
China: Day 9 - Yangtze River
We took an early morning trip today up the Shennong River, another tributary to the Yangtze. Our trip involved boarding a smaller ferry size craft, for a 40 minute ride up up the Shennong. Along the way we saw a few landmarks such as the Elephant Trunk peak, a 5 mile deep swallow cave, and another site where a coffin in a cave can be seen. This coffin was in a particularly high and hazardous position that defies explanation of how the people, actually got it there.
When we reached a barge anchored to the middle of the river, we got off our ferry boat, and boarded river boats powered by 5 men: 3 oars men on the front, one on the back along with the "captain" who controlled the tiller. They recreated a typical boat ride as it occurred in ancient times. We even had 2 of the oars men jump off and ceremoniously drag the boat upstream using a bamboo rope. In ancient times, when the boats were large or the water low, the boats would drag on the bottom. Men made their living as "trackers", which involved pulling these boats up and down stream. Since their clothing was poorly made, it was quite rough material, and to avoid chaffing the trackers worked naked. Sometimes over 300 trackers were needed to pull the larger boats along the river.
On the way back to the cruise ship we saw a small herd of goats high along the bank, as well as a few wild monkeys.
For the remainder of the day we relaxed on board our ship, and watched as we passed through 2 of the main Gorges along the river: the Wu Gorge (45 km) and the Qutang Gorge (8 km).
There was an optional (extra $) excursion late in the day to White Emperor City, but we did not participate.
