“Travelling into Sichuan is difficult, even harder than climbing to the blue sky.” A poem by Li Po from Tang Dynasty 1,200 years ago described the difficulty of communications on the river. In ancient times, all transportation in the Three Gorges region was almost…

Meng Liang Ladder is at the entrance to Qutang Gorge, also on the southern bank of the river and to the east of the Whitewashed Wall. It is a Z-shaped series of holes chiseled into the rock face, each hole measuring 33 cm deep,…

Homepage>Cruise Guide>Whitewashed Wall The Whitewashed Wall (Chalk Wall) is to be found at Kuimen (Kui Gate) on the cliff face of the White Salt Mountain on the southern bank of the river. It is so named because the cliff face looks whitish and it…

Homepage>Cruise Guide>Kui Gate Kuimen, or Kui Gate, is also known as Qutang Pass, the door to Three Gorges. Here the river is flanked by sheer cliffs on both sides. It is the gate through which the Yangtze River flows into the Three Gorges from…

The first local people our Yangtze cruisers are going to meet are those at the harbor: peddlers, carriers, porters. Porters would be the first of first to be noticed. They would come to surround you, offering you their help with your bags to your…