Somewhere down the crazy river

I am not sure how much of the Three Gorges the kids saw, as they went all Lord of the Flies during the cruise. They rounded up the Western children and formed a wild gang. There were 2 kiwis, 2 aussies and a boy from Washington plus our very roudy bunch and they ran wild for 3 days. We only saw them at dinner times, when Joe and I had the pleasure of sitting with the entire tribe (they’re parents had seen fit to swap to other more adult tables). This was actually enormous fun and we genuinely thank their parents for this, erm, back-handed compliment?

As a cruise this was, sadly, all we had dreaded before booking Galapagos. For three days we tried to avoid the Mayor of Camarillo with his self-promotion and anti smoking lectures, a large and very French party, and the join-in entertainment. We tried to avoid the mad scramble at buffet times by turning up late or not at all. People would keep a hawk-like watch for plate refills. False rumours would spread. “More watermelon, apparently” the mutter would go round. Like a frightened rabbit, a crew member would enter cautiously, carrying the enormous platter full of watermelon, then make a panicked sprint for the table. Before the plate was down, thirty grown (mostly overgrown) adults would dive at the platter with forks extended. Triumphantly they would emerge from the scrum with 5 or more pieces of watermelon skewered. After a frenzied thirty seconds, the battered server would emerge, shaken. The platter would be down. 3 pieces of watermelon would remain. A paper deserves to be written on the horror of human behaviour in a buffet situation.
We watched the crew perform ‘minority dances’ with a kind of fascinated horror, tried hard not to giggle when forced to meet Captain Wei and listen to his shouting, and sat as low as possible in our seats during the games and dancing. Of course, the kids have no such taste scruples. Jenna danced her socks off at the nightly disco until she was the last one on the floor and literally crying with exhaustion. Rhys cried on NOT being picked for the various demeaning games, whereas Joe cried when he WAS picked. I sought refuge away from it all in an amazing hour-long massage. I was pummelled, pulled and squished, had my toes snapped and thighs beaten – it is strange that we PAY people to do this to us! I did feel lighter than air as a result however and ready to face life on deck once more.

So it was without too much regret we regained solid land.

We got off the boat for the last time to see the dam, which is almost complete (albeit apparently with about a hundred cracks in its full length). This is an amazing advert for modern communism. It’s hard to get the scale of the thing in your head. It’s massive, the world’s biggest, 2 kilometres wide, with jaw droppingly large locks and ship lifts. It sits 185 metres high and will flood an area the size of Singapore. The whole place is clean and efficient in a slightly creepy way with immaculate landscaped walkways and fountains performing to piped music. This however was infinitely preferable to the performance of the tour guide on our bus. Oh, how she tried. She gripped her microphone and told us over and over again how happy and honoured she was to be with us. She desperately exhorted us to be happy. She tried to instigate bus karaoke. With no takers, she resorted to performing herself. Our brains began to melt. In a last ditch attempt to galvanise us, she told us it was her birthday. I think there were only a few cynics on the bus, but luckily we sat together. We had liked Brian and Carol from California immediately: Brian is the Californian equivalent to my Uncle Dave. He liked a chat, a drink and a smoke, and had a wicked sense of humour. He’s also been running commercial fishing vessels for 30 years, so has many a great tale to tell. Apparently he is on page 89 of the book of The Perfect Storm – we bewailed the fact they couldn’t find anyone better looking than George Clooney to play him. So, we had good company to gnash teeth and be quietly sarcastic with on the karaoke bus from hell. It descended utterly as we were treated to a rousing chorus of Home of the Range and some deeply patriotic song about California from the rest of the US contingent. That was somewhat relieved by a rendition of ‘Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport’ during which we were able to add all the rude bits. I don’t know whether to be proud or hang my head in shame to admit that Rowan and Rhys did their bit and sang Penblwydd Hapus to the guide.

As the kids said their fond farewells to the tribe Joe and I were trying hard not to punch the air in celebration at being away from organised tour groups again. Hello Yichang, with two weeks to go to Beijing, and many stops en route. With, thankfully, just us.