We have covered some territory since Shanghai, initially by going by train to Yichang and sailing up the Yangtze river by hydrofoil through the legendary Three Gorges on to Wanzhou. This area was incredibly beautiful and as a bonus was accompanied by cakes from Shanghai. The journey was something I have dreamed of doing since I was young but never thought I'd get to even if I did make it to China, as some years ago they started the Three Gorges Dam project and there was much fear that this would flood the valleys to such an extent that they all but disappeared. In reality this has not happened so drastically but the dam is not yet complete and even so the level has risen alarmingly. The area must have been absolutely stunning before the dam project but now huge areas of formerly inhabited land is permanently under water and the best predictions set the future rise, on completion of the dam, to between 40 and 80 metres: a huge environmental impact by any standards. That said the gorges were impressive, rising steeply from the river and stretching on seemingly forever into the distance. A wonderful way to travel.
In Wanzhou we managed to secure same-day tickets to Chengdu, and after a somewhat surreal tea-infused wait in the lounge of a nearby hotel courtesy of the very kind (and now 50 yuan richer) owners followed by some great almost-street food in the adjoining almost-cafe we were on our way. A reasonably good night in hard sleeper passed uneventfully and we were met at the station by our new abode Sim's Cozy Hostel (thoroughly recommended if you come here). As it was about 6:30, too late for sleep and too early for rushing around, we took a trip to a panda breeding centre (Schezuan province is one of the last remaining panda habitats and has a number of breeding and reintroduction schemes up and running). As ever it was pretty grim to see animals in cages but the cages were a good size, with well managed and interesting habitat and the project at least existed primarily for the conservation of the species being held captive - Giant Pandas and Red Pandas. Incredible animals both of them though Ellen is right: the Giant Panda especially seems to excel at stupidity, laziness and unwarranted aggression. For one thing they are carnivores but refuse to eat anything other than bamboo leaves and shoots - which their digestive systems are just not geared up for so they have to consume vast quantities of the things. It seems that neither of them may be bears and are certainly not closely related to each other, but it doesn't seem to bother them being mostly solitary creatures in any case. We finished the day by exploring a magnificent nearby Buddhist temple complex (Wenshu Monastery) and eating at its comically awful vegetarian restaurant. Avoid unless in good humour.
The whirlwind of activity continued apace today as we rose early and headed off to the (fairly) nearby QingCheng Shan, one of the sacred Taoist mountains that I have been itching to get to. Although things were a little complicated to arrange with our Chinese-only speaking driver, whose patience we tried greatly by turning up late for everything, the day was brilliant - really great to escape the city and be in the hills again. As usual we had bitten off almost more than we could chew so it was a fast day zooming up the front face (lots of temples, lots of tourists), not quite reaching the peak and zooming down again so we could go to the back face, which was totally different - hardly any tourists, a medieval town, and stunning landscapes. Again not enough time to do it justice we did manage the world's slowest cable car journey across Five Dragons Gorge before returning the same way to meet our driver in time (nearly). We all pretty much agreed that we would have liked 2 days there to do both sides justice, and this is the minimum time if any real hiking is to be done, but as we didn't have the luxury of time it was well worth the fast pace and we at least had a taste of something we may be able to come back to in the future. We celebrated our hectic day with a slap-up binge at Peter's Tex-Mex Grill, which aside from the expected nachos and tortillas introduced me to the delights of strawberry margaritas - devilishly wonderful nectar I'm happy to report. Needless to say, given that Nic and I were in close proximity to Really Decadent Cakes, we have taken the precaution of stocking up for the train journey tomorrow; well, a hard sleeper through central China just wouldn't be the same without cheesecake and brownies, would it? This journey will take us south-west to Guizhou province from which we shall explore some of the surrounding villages renowned for still being home to minority hill-tribes, and culturally quite distinct from the rest of China. Expect strange pictures...
