JaneB

I read in LP that a hydrofoil goes from Yichang to Wanxian (6 hours) or Yichang to Chongqing (12 hours). I assume it also goes downstream. Does anyone know anything about this? I REALLY do not want to spend 3 days cruising the Yangtze, but would like to see some of the sights near Yichang.

JaneB

HELP!! I have located a schedule for the hydrofoil at www.chinadam.com/transportation/
hydrofoil.htm. It leaves Chongqing at 7:00 and arrives at Yichang at 18:00. Although we will have about 3 weeks in China, I would rather spend time doing something other than cruising. Does ANYONE have any first-hand knowledge of this boat trip? We leave for China on May 10--hopefully arriving in HK and leaving from Beijing. (We are traveling Space A on airline passes from our son-in-law)

PeterN_H

No first-hand knowledge, but the prices quoted on that Web site seem ludicrously high, and clearly aimed at those booking from overseas. If you take this boat you should buy your ticket directly from the operating company on arrival.

Personally, I'd skip the Yangzi altogether, but agree that zooming along a section of it beats the cruise. If the boat is the one I think then its the same Russian-built/Chinese-copied Sputnik-era-looking ones as run across Dongting Hu (a spillover for the Yangzi) and from Ningbo to Putuo Shan. Some of these are more than a little beaten up.

If you take this route, I hope you'll post some information about it afterwards.

Peter N-H
http://members.axion.net/~pnh/China.html

rkkwan

No first hand information here either, but some goggle search does show some tourist's photosites with the 1960's hydrofoil that Peter is talking about.

As far as the fare is concerned, US$50 does seem high, but consider that a 1st class softseater seat on a train from Chongqing to Wuhan (about the same distance by train as Chongqing to Yichang) is 243 Yuans, and take like 15 hours.

You may want to leave that part of the journey open for now until arriving in Hong Kong. You should be able to find travel agencies there (including China's government-run CTS) to book you on the ferry.

Having said that, I think since you have 3 weeks in China, a slow cruise on the Yangtze is recommended. I'd put it in the middle of the journey as some rest days that you'll really appreciate. But that's just me...

JaneB

Thank you, Peter and rkkwan. Both of you post excellent information all the time and I appreciate your help with this. 60's era hydrofoils don't sound very enticing! We don't plan to book any hotels or internal flights until we arrive--heeding information on this forum added to the fact that our arrival and departure dates are always tentative at best due to availability of space on the flights from US!

rkkwan

Just want to add why you may not want to skip the Three Gorges. The big dam is partially finished, and they've already started filling up the reservoir last summer. So, the scenery is already not the same as years before. And in a few years time, the water level will rise again, submerging more parts of the gorges.

Therefore, in my opinion, it's worth a visit nowadays. Maybe you may the find the cruise even more enjoyable after the dam is finished, but it certainly won't be the same. Meanwhile, the Forbidden Palace will still be there, and hopefully exactly the same, in 20 years...

PeterN_H

There's nothing so overstated as the impact of the rising waters on the view of the Three Gorges. The time to make this trip was early last century before dredging, the dynamiting of rocks, and the construction of an earlier dam changed everything anyway, and before the tourism industry gave names to every peak, and invented old stories to go with them.

The 'big change' scare is just that (unless you happen to live next to the water of course), it's been claimed every year since at least 1996 that this was the 'last chance to see', and to fall for this is just to fall for travel agency hype which was intended to keep business brisk. Now the dam is filling there's a massive back-pedelling, of the 'Three Gorges Still to be Beautiful!' kind, as expressed in China Daily, again with the aim of keeping business brisk regardless of truth.

The waters in the gorges have risen just over 4 metres since construction began, and that's where they'll stay until 2006. In 2009 the levels at the dam will finally reach 175 metres (from 66m), whereas land heights in the gorges range from 800 to 1100 metres. Change? Yes. Big change? Not from a tourism point of view, except that the cruising season will be lengthened as the waters are quieter and deeper, and some of China's most hideous and ramshackle factories and housing, once right at the waters' edge, will disappear (where they haven't already done so).

The Palace Museum (Forbidden City), on the other hand, is currently having its northwestern corner rebuilt, and is threatened with a major face-lift before 2008.

Peter N-H
http://members.axion.net/~pnh/China.html

rkkwan

According to all the news reports from June 2003:

Storage began, which would raise the water level at the main dam from 75meters to 135meters. So, that's a 60meter rise, done at 4-5 meters a day over about 2 weeks time last June. In 2009, when the dam is completed, the level will be at 175meters.

So, the water level should have gone up by about 60 meters last summer, at least according to news reports, at least at the dam level. Of course, further up the Yangtze, the less the level rises.

But Peter is right that the Yangtze has been constantly altered over the years. At Yichang, not far from the big dam was already the massive Guozhou dam, built a few decades ago. Like I said, scenery will be different in the future, but if one has 3 weeks in China, I don't see why one shouldn't go on a cruise, in 1994, 2004, or 2014. It's really breathtaking.