Chapter 12- From October 15, 2008

Today was the last day we’ve spent on the cruise on the mighty Yangtze River. And today, was probably one of the most relaxing, one of the most enjoyable, and one of the sadder days of the trip.

We only had one stop today, which was a shore trip to Fengdu. We visited Mt. Mingshan, the Ghost City, and went up to a Taoist temple, founded by Lao Tze. In getting off the boat, we climbed up what seemed to be a mountainside of steps. It looked very similar to the steps and the wall that the man in “Up the Yangtze” had to climb. We found out later in the day that it was the same area. There were lots of them , and we ended up getting to the top, where we were molested by a swarm of street peddlers selling cheep-cheep-you-buy-hello-hey-lady-ten-yuan things. Beating them off with a stick, we progressed up the hill. We had the opportunity to walk up the staired section, which was about 299 steps, or we could have taken the chair lift. Mom and I opted for the chair lift. It was beautiful, and after nearly throwing up from the heights, we arrived at the top safely.

It was a very foggy day, very humid, and we were unable to see the city of Fengdu across the river. We smell the scent of coal burners everywhere. But, it was really cool, learned about this particular monument on the river, and after about 3 hours, trekked our way down to the bottom again.

We ventured back to the boat, where it was time for a bloody mary, time to write in the journal, and time to just wait for the next activity, which was eating. We had lunch, and then afterwards, had a great conversation with Peter and Judy Dunner from the DC area. They have truly been a blessing on our trip. After spending the first week with To Wong Fu and the Empress, we needed to interact with interesting, cool, and depthful people. We found all of this and more with Peter and Judy, as well as their friends Barbara and John. I don’t know what we would have done had they not been on the trip. It’s almost sad that we have to part ways, as they are certainly WAY more fun than the lunkers we’ve been matched with.

After getting back to the ship, we then had an opportunity again to play mah jong, this time it was with mom, Judy, Barbara, and some other woman who was kind of scoldy. And, to top it all off, we used this electric, super-sophisticated mah jong table that set up everything for you. It was like plug and play only better.

Of course, during the whole time we have been on the trip, we have never seen the Empress and TWF except for the few times at lunch and dinner, or on the morning excursions when TWF always asks me to have the guide wait for them so that they can run upstairs, have a cigarette, and probably slam a glass of booze in the process. I keep thinking to myself, “yeah, I’ll get right on that” and the moment they leave I’m wishing the tour guides will head out. All I know is that they spend most of their time in their 9x9 cabin, the balcony, smoking cartons of cigarettes, and drinking booze from sun up to sun down. That’s what I call a fun cruise…

Anyhow, we had another decent dinner tonight, and then we got to see some traditional chinese music, with a hammer dulcimer thing, the chinese flutes, the erhu, some percussion, and some liu chen. It was cool, though a little disappointing in that we were unable to see the guzheng played. Ah well…

Afterward, there was another activity. Let’s just say that mom doesn’t have to worry about fodder for her christmas cards this year.

We need to get up early tomorrow, set out for Chongqing (the largest metropolitan area in
China) and then we’re off to Xian for 2 days.

It will truly be interesting this next week to see how things go, and I’m looking forward to the new adventures and stories this trip will bring, though we certainly are going to miss the new friends we met while on the Yangtze.