{"id":1052,"date":"2017-05-01T08:29:04","date_gmt":"2017-05-01T08:29:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mak.iqt.com.au\/?p=1052"},"modified":"2017-05-01T08:29:04","modified_gmt":"2017-05-01T08:29:04","slug":"28th-april-wushan-to-yichang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mak.iqt.com.au\/?p=1052","title":{"rendered":"28th April – Wushan to Yichang"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today we drive approximately 230 km to Yichang to visit the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River. \u00a0Quite a few of the cities we have visited have a statue of a horse standing on 1 leg & as we leave Wushan we see another one. \u00a0We notice an interesting umbrella set up on the motor bikes, good for the sun & rain, but I imagine not too good in the wind. \u00a0We drive through beautiful countryside with\u00a0tea terraces and\u00a0a mountain backdrop.<\/p>\n

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Before we are allowed into the area we have to buy a permit which takes about half an hour as the local officers had to ask their senior officials for permission to allow us to enter.\u00a0 The drivers had to show their passport, Chinese drivers licence & the cars temporary Chinese licence plate. Once again we become the attraction and we are asked to have our photo taken with a couple of lovely looking young ladies.<\/p>\n

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When we arrive at the dam we have lunch in the car park which has grassed parking bays laid out amongst trees & gardens, it’s lovely. \u00a0First we catch a series of escalators up to a viewing platform overlooking the 5 locks that allow the boats access from the river to the gorges area and vice versa. It takes 3-4 hours to pass through the locks and each boat has a weight limit of 10,000 tonnes.<\/p>\n

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We walk further around to see the boat lift, which has a boat weight limit of 3,000 tonnes but only takes 40 minutes for a boat to pass from the river level to the gorges level and vice versa.<\/p>\n

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Last we visit the memorial park which gives us a good view of the dam wall and where the water is expelled after passing through the turbines to create electricity. \u00a0The grounds are maintained by hand, we only saw 1 man using a whipper snipper and not a lawn mower to cut the grass.<\/p>\n

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Some interesting\u00a0dam facts:<\/p>\n