The Far West: nineteen days in China by Carrie King

again in the last day in a city, a perfect clear blue sky morning. wonderful weather to see the big wild goose pagoda, and sit quietly in the gardens for a little while. next, the old city wall. the only city wall remaining in a major city, by the grace of chou enlai who felt the red guards should not knock down the old walls of the first ancient capital of a unified China. Xian was China's capital for longer than Beijing has been.

flight to wuhan. waiting in an airport, also a newish airport, though smaller than beijing's. fred reassures us that we'll only be taking airbus or boeing flights, no russian planes. flight uneventful.

arrive in wuhan to spend the afternoon before boarding the riverboat. local guide tony has shiny white shoes. he takes us to visit one of wuhan's large department stores -- it looks like any american warehouse store inside, except for signs in chinese and unfamiliar brands. david's quest for a good wine to take on the boat. joe and terry get replacement luggage. fred tells how on certain days (holidays? sales?) the lines are 40 minutes long even when all fifty or sixty checkers are open.

then to the wuhan regional museum, where we learn of a tomb found with a roomful of musical instruments, including a giant set of bells. such had been seen and described in old drawings and documents before, but had never been found -- through said documents they figured out how they were intended to be played. demonstration concert using a reproduced set of bells, with accompanying contemporary-reproduction instruments. quite nice. a little bit of mental disconnection when they played the "ode to joy" theme as their last piece.

as evening was falling, we arrive at the boat. departing after dark, i and surprisingly few others are up top to witness our departure. city lights on the one side of the river, only a few on the other. second Moment of Idiocy: had left my camera bag in my cabin, thus missed beautiful shots of the lighted bridge we sailed under and the spotlighted TV tower.

dinner in the dining hall, orientation up in the Yangtze Club. don't worry, even if the boat were to sink, most places the river is shallower than the boat is tall, so if everyone comes up here like you're supposed to, we could just hang out here until they came to rescue us...

we're on the river, on our way. this is why i came. on deck for a last look, motoring into the night.