{"id":1818,"date":"2004-05-14T12:43:00","date_gmt":"2004-05-14T17:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/?p=1818"},"modified":"2025-06-03T09:53:56","modified_gmt":"2025-06-03T14:53:56","slug":"chongqing-entry-to-the-yangtze-gorges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/2004\/05\/14\/chongqing-entry-to-the-yangtze-gorges\/","title":{"rendered":"Chongqing–entry to the Yangtze Gorges"},"content":{"rendered":"

May 14, 2004<\/p>\n

I’m sitting in a five star hotel in Chongqing thinking about Troop 19–waiting for our trip down the Yangtze to begin. Some highlights so far:<\/p>\n

1) Believe it or not, my Chinese is passable. I got separated from the group at the Great Wall and had to hitch a ride back to the car. I have been able to negotiate food, bargains, etc.<\/p>\n

2) Bike rides. Again, unbelievably, we went on the streets of Beijing the \"\"<\/a> \"\"<\/a>other day, which was really neat. We got up early (of course) and biked from our hotel to the<\/p>\n

Forbidden City (around 4 miles each way), then stopped at a hill overlooking the Forbidden City (where most of the pictures are taken).<\/p>\n

Today, we went to the City Wall in Xian, where you can rent bikes. So we did.<\/p>\n

3) China has changed a lot since I started coming here 14 years ago. There is<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
three gorges dam<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

a lot more business. Chongqing has skyscrapers, shops, and shoppers. Lots of building. I remember in 1990 there was little electricity at night. Now there is neon everywhere. Our hotel had an ice skating rink, and I remember Phil Pusateri wowing the locals.\u00a0 Seems like he’d played hockey in high school.<\/p>\n

4) Though I have been to most of the places I am going, the thrill of the Forbidden City, the Great Wall, the Temple of Heaven, the terracotta \"\"<\/a>warriors, remains as it was the first time I saw it. It helps that I am sharing it with students who are seeing it for the first time.<\/p>\n

Sort of like some of our scout trips.<\/p>\n

In case you are feeling sorry, I am going to do some yoga, swim, and take a sauna before signing off for tonight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

May 14, 2004 I’m sitting in a five star hotel in Chongqing thinking about Troop 19–waiting for our trip down the Yangtze to begin. Some highlights so far: 1) Believe it or not, my Chinese is passable. I got separated from the group at the Great Wall and had to hitch a ride back to … Continue reading “Chongqing–entry to the Yangtze Gorges”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-may-2004-china-yangtze-burma"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1818"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9266,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818\/revisions\/9266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}