A Morning Spent On The Edge Leads To A Gorgeous Afternoon

We woke up to rain.  I had already decided to skip the morning excursion, to another village, which included a sanpan ride.  Those who went on the excursion enjoyed it, but Carol and I made the right choice to skip it.

That’s because I realized I would have been too on edge, trying to get updates on the NCAA Final between a team I started madly rooting for in 2014, the University of Virginia and Texas Tech, a team I’ve never paid any attention to in any sport.  I would have been miserable. 

Don tried to hook up his laptop to the TV in the barroom on the ship.  That didn’t work, and nor did trying to watch it on his Sling pass on my iPad.  The game would show up, but buffer quite a bit.  Leo had warned us that the wifi in the gorges area would be spotty.

Instead, we were reduced to following the typed play-by-play on ESPN.com.  What a roller coaster of a game!  The Cardiac Cavs came through, coming from behind in the last 13 seconds to send the game into overtime.  As I sat on a riverboat in Badong, China on the Yangzi River half a world away, I couldn’t take the delays.  So I called Torie, and she gave me the play-by-play of the last 45 seconds as UVA pulled away.  What a thrill!

The win made the day for Carol and I.  Between being in Oslo when the Capitals won the Stanley Cup and now being in China when UVA won their first NCAA Tournament title, I need to monetize this.  Sports teams – if you have been on the brink but can’t get over the hump to win a championship, just pay for an exotic overseas trip for me.

(Phone rings.

Me: Huh, 202 area code?  Answers phone, “hello?”

Voice: “Hi, this is Davey Martinez.  Can you save my job?”

Me: “You may have to pay for a trip to the moon!”)

After lunch, during which I was walking on air, we had some free time.  The ship passed through the Wu Gorge, which includes the famous Goddess Peak.  (Editor’s Note: I’ve never heard of it.  Blogger: But it is famous!  Editor: You saying so doesn’t make it so.  Blogger: The daily info sheet on the boat said it is famous.  Editor: Okay, that I can accept.)

There are twelve peaks in all along the Wu Gorge, and the Goddess Peak is the largest and most notable peak in the Wu Gorge.  The Goddess Peak is a small rock finger sticking up, and resembles a girl looking down at the boats.

Then, Andrew gave an interesting lecture to the Nat Geo folks on the agriculture history in China, and the differences in crops and farm life between North and South China.  Andrew would be great to have had as a professor (unlikely to have happened, as he is four years younger than I am!) because he’s very interesting and speaks in plain English, albeit a little too softly.

Andrew (on the left) getting ready for his talk.

From there, we headed outside once more for the passage through the third and last gorge, the Qutang Gorge.  All three gorges were stunning.  The only bummer is that the sky was mostly cloudy, mean pictures were not optimal.  Overall, however, the gorges were visually stunning.  Sometimes Carol and I felt like we were back in the Lemaire Channel in Antarctica, except the mountains are green instead of white.  Oh, and there were other ships.  But there was definitely a similar vibe to the place.