Day 13 – Sunday 15 April - A Dam Long Day!

At the command of the Madame of the boat, a fearsome cross between a German weight lifter and the nasty Russian spy from the Fleming novel, a woman who we affectionately dubbed “Brun Hilda” as the voyage moved one, we rose early.
Thus the morning begins with an early breakfast and then an excursion to the colossal Three Gorges Dam site, the world's largest water engineering project to date. At 9am in the morning it is still brutal and misty and we can just about make out the silhouette of the construction.

After briefly returning for lunch at 11am (daft) we finally disembark for the coach to take us to Yi Chang. It's now 1pm, the sun is out, the sky is clear and its 34C. We're stuck on a coach for two hours during a time of the day when the Dam would have been entirely visible and we could have been awake and a joy to be in the open.

The guide on the coach tries to occupy us with some interesting facts, Apparently Yi Chang was home to one of China's most famous poets - he was up there with Shakespeare. No doubt therefore, in existence somewhere are, hitherto undiscovered Chinese masterpieces including:
"Much Ado About Noodles", "MacFang", "Han-Let" and "ChowMein the Third part II".

At Yi Change we are met by our host who will show us the sights. This turns out to be a 30 minute stop at an embroidery factory with a large outlook shop.

Next we have an hour's journey to the airport. By now it's about 35C.

We queue for 30 minutes to check in before a 90 minute wait for China Eastern's flight to Shanghai. We check in our two hold bags at 19.5Kg and 20.0kg (maximum 20kg strictly enforced) and then proceed through the x-ray machine with seven carry-on bags, total weight just under 900kg. Mad, isn't it! The flight is packed to the wings and we're tired and hot. Sonia can't remember taking off and awakes to see house tops on the approach into Shanghai's smaller airport.

After a 30 minute wait for baggage (this is the smaller, faster airport at Shanghai) we traipse out and meet Kelly our guide for the next 5 days. Welcomed with a nice smile, we board the transit for the two hour drive to Suzhou.

Our final destination for the day is the Bamboo Grove Hotel, which is lovely, and we agree with Kelly we don't want an early start the next day!