China Day 6, Three Gorges Dam Project

Saturday July 2^nd

We were woken up at 7:00, by nice music and then a breakfast announcement in Chinese, then English. We learned everything is done in a very orderly fashion at precise times. In addition to our group there is a Gecko group of twelve western tourists and four young university students who have been teaching in China for the last four months. There are also an equal number of Chinese tourists. At eight we set sail as we were docked for the night. After breakfast we explored the boat and sat up on either the sun deck, level five, or the fourth level where we could sit up front and see where we were going. The weather was quite warm and the air was hazy. The scenery was quite nice as we were sailing through Xiling Gorge. This is part of the controversial Three Gorge Dam Project, reputed to be the largest dam in the world (not sure how – cement, volume of water, or electricity generated?). It is controversial as the government had to relocate 1.3 million people to higher ground before they flooded the area. I can't imagine what it cost to build this dam, build all the new cities and relocate the people. And the dam only provides 3% of China's energy needs!

After lunch we boarded a bus for an excursion to the actual dam. The weather was very hot, 36 degrees and mostly sunny. We went to a couple of spots, the best of which was the highest viewpoint where we could see an overview of the whole area, the dam, the lock system and the river above and below the dam. The dam holds the water up to 120 metres above the lower part. As a result in order for the river boats to pass the dam they had to build a series of five locks that can raise or lower the boats that distance as quickly as possible. There is a series for up river boats and another set for down river.

Then we returned to the boat and sailed towards the dam. It took us three and a half hours to sail through the five locks. Much like any other lock only on a much larger scale. We all watched the process for the first lock as they parked six large boats in the lock and then floated us up to the next.

Dinner was a seven and after dinner the crew put on a talent show party. They sang and danced and acted a bit. Then any tourist who wanted to could perform. A few people sang Karaoke and played piano. Then off to bed for a well deserved sleep.