Sunrise on the Yangtze

Dawn breaks, blue and misty, on the Yangtze River.

I wander out on deck into the chill morning air, hoping to catch a glimpse of the fleet shadows of wizened oarsmen and the twinkling lanterns of cormorant fishermen on the old river. Instead, I catch a whiff of diesel as we pass an enormous, coal-laden barge. The old ways are going, or have long since gone…

I am not alone on deck. Next to me, a bent, elderly couple reminisce in low voices about a trip to Guilin. Further along, a group of swarthy men with brutish faces huddle in a corner, shoulders squared against the breeze, smoking and ever so often hawking and spitting ostentatiously into the river.

We arrive at Wushan shortly after daybreak, and transfer to a series of smaller ferries for our excursion to the Lesser Three Gorges. The crowds – mostly domestic tourists – are rowdy and excitable. A vendor passes through the cabin, selling roast 'mountain hens' – were they pigeons, I wonder? – splayed, skewered, and stacked high on a large silver dish. Evidently a crowd-pleaser, the vendor does a brisk trade, and the cabin is soon crunching its way through the little birds, tossing bones and scraps nonchalantly out the windows to the swirling waters below.