7. Yangtze River aboard the boat

Talk about a view! The river is phenominal, we are surrounded by rainforest greenery on both sides, wildlife and culture seeping in from all angles and the sunrise was astounding. We've departed Chongqing and are headed toward Yichang on our boat tour. There are only the three of us and 5 other passengers on this giant river cruise boat, so there's lots of room to move around and there are many staff to chat to about the history of the Yangtze and the surrounding areas. On the third and last day of our river cruise we'll be seeing the Three Gorges Dam, this dam is the largest hydro-electric power station in the entire world! The staff have been very easy to talk to and speak wonderful english, and have told us that the Chinese call the river Jiang or Da Jiang which means Great River. Weve been on the lookout for Chinese Finless Porpoise but have had no luck spotting any so far. The locals aboard our river boat call them "river pigs" and they were thought to be extinct in 2006 but have recently been surfacing again, there's less than 1400 left in the world according to research, and their having a hard time increasing their population.

The fisherman onboard also told us about some of the history and importance of the Yangtze River. He mentioned that China's agriculture grew significantly when proper irrigation from the River was built and became very important in China's economy. In history, the river also was used quite often to seperate North and South China because the river runs East to West across the country. Because it was the seperator, many battles were fought along it's edge, and it used to be very difficult to cross into the opposing territory.

well, were off to enjoy the scenery and culture along the way, we'll talk again when we hit Yichang, we won't have any internet connectivity on our journey from here on.