Thurs, 4/26.  Incredible hazy day.  Awful photo weather.

Chinese are a noisy society.  Debarking the boat gave evidence.  Nice funicular railway to get up to the parking lot.  Our luggage was again carried four at a time manually by porters.

Tour of the Three Gorges Dam was at quite a distance.  Closer were the duel five-lock passage and single boat elevator, which was actually (to my) the most impressive part.  The dam is large, as are the locks.  But they’re fairly settled engineering feats.  More significant to me has always been the resettlement of 1.3 million people from thousand-year-old communities.  But this aspect is hugely underplayed by the Chinese.  Jacky says “people don’t care”.  I’m not entirely sure that the true answer isn’t “people fear saying anything”.  Probably a little of both.  Bottom line though, the project will vastly improve the quality of life.  More clean power, much, much less flooding.  They have four more dams envisioned upriver.

Drive to Wuhan sorta fast, pretty bumpy.  Nice looking highway (advertisements on bridges), but not exactly flat.  If we’d been on a plane, the “Fasten Seatbelt” sign would have been on the whole way.  Farm lands, burial sites, very limited ruins.  It seems common throughout the country that ruined buildings (eyesores) are torn down.  The USA could take a lesson.

Hotel is based in an old traditional building with very modern resort structures nearby.  The concept does not work.  Pond in the back is a haven for mosquitos.  Huge lazy susan at dinner.

Tomorrow we fly to Hong Kong.