~Entering the Unknown~

I woke up at 5:30am to tour the cruise at 6am.

Level 1: staff rest/bed rooms, meal area. They were rather dull and shabby and I saw their breakfast of porridge and salted vegetable in their canteen.
Level 2: Main hall, dining hall and guest bedrooms
Level 3: Guest bedrooms, clinic, reading room, Internet room (10RMB/Hour)
Level 4: Guest bedrooms
Level 5: Mini bar, majong room, KTV Lounge and gym room
Level 6: Wine bar and starboard

At 6:30am, I proceeded to early bird breakfast of pastries and coffee in the mini bar at level 5. They tasted ordinary. At 7am, I proceeded for my breakfast buffet in the dining hall at level 2. I learnt that other than the 16 people in my tour group, there were 20 people from Hong Kong and 3 people from Shanghai who joined us on the cruise, which made up a total of less than 40 people. I had fried hor fun, chilli noodle soup and orange juice, the noodle texture was better than that in Holiday Inn hotel. I noticed all fellow tour members reached the hall the earliest at 7am, people from Hong Kong came around 7:30am while parents and bro dragged to the hall at 7:45am. Meanwhile, the housekeeping staffs proceeded to clean our rooms at 8:30am, so we could only enter the room after they finished the work. We were told that as the towels would not be changed during the three days on cruise, we could only ask for replacement upon request.

Port of Yi Chang
At 9am, we came down the cruise with our boarding pass (orange band) to tour the Three Gorge dam; mum was again pestered by the sellers to buy their maps of Yangtze river.

It was drizzling and raining later heavily, I dropped my poor digital camera 2 times throughout the trip and had to wash my hair the moment I returned back to the cruise, shivering in cold.

There were several dishes for our lunch at 12pm. Out of which, I enjoyed roast pork with honey best, I could taste its juiciness and sweetness beneath its crispy skin. While we ate, the cruise departed from the port at 1pm.

We spent the rest of the day listening to talks on changes in Three Gorges and I actually slept during the talk between 4:30pm to 5:30pm. Couldn’t resist my sleepy bug.

The cruise stopped at Baidong port.

We had dinner at 7pm. Other than some usual dish, we had minced chicken noodle soup (plain) and coffee cheesecake that was not cheesy enough. After a short rest in our room, we proceeded to a welcome tea at 8:30pm. I was given a champagne before I shrank away from the crews to a table with bro and mum. After the captain’s introductory speech, there were games and snacks that I gladly avoided to catch night scenery on level 6.

I rushed back to level 6 again after returning back to room when I heard sound of fireworks from nearby cruises. Somehow, I’m glad to be in this trip for I never watch fireworks and firecrackers before till I came on this trip.