Laura
Day 1: We got on the boat at 8pm on Thursday night and settled into our cozy little cabin. We had a bit of a laugh at the ensuite - a squat toilet, with a shower directly above it. We had to literally stand on the toilet to shower! Beautiful. We were confused by the boat restaurant and so were forced to eat pot noodles for tea (not the English variety, these actually resemble noodles and taste quite nice). Then we had a bit of a wonder around before having an early night.
Day 2: We got woken up at 6am by a loud knocking on the door and a Chinese tour guide (presumably) telling us to get up. We had docked at Ghost City and they were very keen that we should get up and experience it's delights for the next 3 hours. By 7.30 me, Paul and Catriona were up and out, unfortunately Brian was sick in bed so he missed out the amazing site ahead of us. We walked up to the city, which was in fact a bizarre temple amusement park on top of a hill in the middle of nowhere. We weren't quite sure of its historical significance (I doubt it has any), but we were put off the entrance fee and the huge Heavenly Wonderland that was being built in the hillside. This wonderland appeared to consist of a variety of buildings that were built in various shapes to resemble a giant Buddha sitting in the hillside. It was grotesque and weird, it even included slides! We basically decided that it was just a tourist circus and went back to the boat to save our seats on the top deck.
Well, we needn't have bothered worrying about saving our place on the top deck because everyone else (we were the only westerners on board, apart from a strange old German guy who wore the same clothes for the entire journey) clearly decided that staying in their stuffy cabins was much more fun than watching the amazing scenery go by! I think they'd had their fill of excitement for the day with the wonderland and needed the rest. Adding to that, there were no tour guides on the top deck so they would have been lost without being told what important features to take photos of were. So we sat out all day reading and enjoying the views. Very nice and relaxing!
We decided to brave the boat restaurant, but were met by nervous, confused gesturing by the staff who could not speak a word of English. It seemed that we were supposed to have pre-ordered food (judging by the masses of people shoving past us to get seats on tables full of food). Luckily one of the tour guides spoke English so she helped us order and we eventually had a really nice meal, washed down with a beer or two.

At 10pm we docked again at another temple, but this one seemed genuine so we hopped off to have a look around. It was quite spooky looking around it in the pitch dark and we were a little bit drunk on beer so we found it rather amusing also. It was quite impressive, as are all temples in China. After a month in China though we are all a bit templed out and were more excited by the supermarket we spotted on the way up to the temple, which sold marshmallows and sachets of instant coffee! Hurrah!

Day 3: We got woken up at some ridiculous hour again because we had docked at another random temple/pagoda. Paul and Brian went to check it out while I and Caitriona decided we would rather stay in bed till some more reasonable hour. The boys came back a while later after walking up a million steps before deciding that the 'site' looked like another tourist circus and came back to the boat. At around midday the boat set off for the first of the three gorges. It was a little misty but the views were spectacular! The gorge was massive and we were surrounded by huge hills covered in trees every shade of green. It's really hard to describe but it was amazing, and unlike anything we've ever seen before. Even the Chinese tourists came out to have a look and get their photos taken a million times. It was really hard to take it all in because it was so unbelievably beautiful - like something you see in a movie or a nature program. We loved it.

Soon after this we were told by a panicky tour guide that we needed to start queuing downstairs to get off the boat to go and see the Three Little Gorges.
So we did as we were told and waiting in the lobby (which smelled of toilets) and had all the occupants of the boat trying to push their way forward to be the first off the boat. When we finally docked, 30 minutes later we got pushed and shoved onto a smaller boat to go and see the gorges. We had bought the cheapest tickets for this and so were expecting to be on a really crappy boat with no outside deck. We were wrong. Everyone seemed to get on the same boats, regardless of ticket type, and once again we had the top deck to ourselves because all the Chinese tourists preferred to sit inside listening to the tour guide (who literally did not stop speaking for the entire 5 hour tour). Bonus!

We stopped en route for some more random tourist sites and witnessed a hilarious incident at a waterfall. All the Chinese tourists were pushing and shoving each other to get to the water in order to fill up their water bottles (the tour guide must have told them it would give them good luck or eternal youth or something). It was like little kids fighting over sweets or something. It really was pathetic. I and Caitriona had decided that it would be nice to splash some of the fresh cold spring water over our faces, as it was boiling hot weather. But we got shoved out of the way by some old crazy woman and soon gave up. It was good that we did really because just as we walked away a fight broke out between two grown men trying to get to the water first. It was as if they thought the waterfall was going to turn off if they didn't get to it in the next 5 seconds. Bizarre.

Anyway, the 3 little gorges were amazing and even more colorful than the first big gorge we'd seen that morning. It was an amazing experience to see it all and it summed up for us why we wanted to go traveling in the first place - the world really is a beautiful place! It was quite sad to see it all and think that most of it will be under water soon because of the stupid dam they are building upstream. Plus there are so many villages set really close to the river and who knows what will happen to those poor people when their houses are under water.

We docked again and got onto some tiny wooden boats to see the 3 mini gorges (we really didn't know what was going on at this point because we had never heard of them). Anyway, I almost got off the boat again straight away because I almost got pushed over board by some stupid woman who thought it was absolutely necessary to shove passed me in order to claim one of the 20 seats left on the 30 seat boat. After sitting down (and tying the life jacket firmly round myself) we set off, with the tour guide singing to us in Chinese. It was nice (after we stopped giggling childishly with embarrassment). The three mini gorges really were mini, but spectacular none the less. It was a really good experience traveling down the river between the tiny gorges in that little wooden boat. The boat was so close to the water that we could put our hands in it, (and the water was blue/green rather than the horrid brown color that the rest of the Yangzi river is).
We got back onto our other boat and made our way back through the little gorges. Ooh i almost forgot - we saw some monkeys gathered together at the edge of the river and swinging in trees! They were really cute and it was cool to see them in the wild.
When we got back to our boat we ate more noodles, drank beer, and played cards on the empty deck (still confused as to why nobody else wanted to sit out there, not that we were complaining!) and reflected on the amazing day we'd had. We made Brian and Caitriona laugh when we told them that a few people told us they thought going traveling was a waste of money. Nobody could ever say that after experiencing those gorges. That's what life is about!

Day 4: We woke up at around 6am to find ourselves going through the second of the main Three Gorges. Breakfast had just been announced so once again we had the top deck to ourselves to take in the views! Which was a good thing really because I was still in my pajamas! This gorge was just as amazing as the first but looked even more brilliant in the rising sun. What a memorable sight.

We had breakfast on top deck before going back to bed for a couple of hours. The boat docked again for some more random historical sites. This time it included a small temple dedicated to some Chinese poet. There were also some dragon boats which you could pay to go in and be rowed 50 meters before they set off some fire crackers and rowed you back. We stayed on the boat.

After the exciting temple and dragon boats all the other passengers went down to their stuffy rooms to sleep while we enjoyed passing through the final gorge. Again it was amazing, but we were sad to see the final one go, knowing that we will never be able to see the gorges again looking as they do now.

It took us about 4 hours to pass through the 4 locks in the  dam. This was the most fun part of the dam. Well, it was the first and second time, but it did get a bit tedious 4 hours later. We got to actually experience the dam and didn't have to pay ten pounds for it. But it was a dam.... so it really wasn't THAT exciting. Even if it is the biggest in the world. Especially after the amazing scenery we'd just seen.

Yichang - Wuhan:
We got off the boat in Yichang at 2 in the morning, after getting a few hours sleep. We were really annoyed because when we bought the tickets we were told that we would be getting off at 6.30 am, rather than the middle of the night. But, we couldn't exactly argue considering we don't speak Chinese! The key reason I found later was that the cruise we took was for domestic tourists instead for overseas VIPs. That is the real situation happened all the way. So we got our 4 hour bus journey and arrived in Wuhan at 5.30am. Luckily the bus driver took us to the train station, where we bought our tickets on to Guilin. Our train leaves at midnight so we have spent the day reading in a lovely park.

It was such an amazing and relaxing few days - we all got through a book each, it's a hard life! We were sad to be getting off the boat and back to the real (dry) world, where we'd have to get night buses and smelly trains. I know you all feel SO sorry for us.