Hello from Richmond...for now

Hello to everyone out there who I remember to send the address of this blog too! For now, this blog will serve as a way for those who are interested to follow me as I travel through China for 12 days or so.
This trip is the first step. I was watching a documentary where a woman who is traveling the world was told how lucky she is to be traveling. And she replied that it wasn't luck, it was a state of mind. And while I am not going to be maxing out my credit cards to see the world in a year (not yet at least...applications being accepted for travel partners though!) I decide that really it is pointless to always say year after year how I want to travel and experience things without actually doing them. So the plan is to travel abroad at least once a year. And this trip to China is the first in that series.
Next year the work on the Three Gorges Dam will be finished next year. There was been a lot of flooding already on the Yangtze, and a lot of wonderful sights are lost forever already. But next year, the transformation of the Gorges and the Lesser Gorges will be complete. I am going this summer to make sure that at least I can see that small glimmer of what they once were, before the shine fades forever.
Here is the general outline for the trip. After spending 15 hours in a plane from Canada, I will land in Shanghai roughly 16 hours ahead of the time my body is used to. After four days in Shanghai, I will fly into the interior to Chongqing, quite possibly the biggest city in the world. (some say as high as 40 million in the metro area) After two days in Chongqing and hopefully a LOT of spicey food, I will be taking a Chinese tourist boat down the Yangtze through the Three Gorges to Yichang City, right on the edge of the dam itself. I fly to Shanghai for three more days. On my last night in Shanghai, I am going all out, and spending the night in the highest hotel in the world. I will swim in the highest hotel in the world, and take a bath in my room over 1,000 feet in the air with floor to ceiling windows showing me Pudong and the rest of Shanghai. It should be quite fun.
I will try to post on here every night. However, I have heard stories of internet cafes in China not allowing people to post photos. This might be especially true given the run up to the Olympics. I will be taking a page out of my buddy Franky's blog when he traveled, and posting after the fact if necessary. So I will miss a few days on the cruise, but when I return to Shanghai I will post separate blogs for the days I missed so everyone knows what was going on. And when I return to Richmond, and after I sleep literally all day in order to catch up on the time, I will post a lot of nice photos on here.
Then on Saturday I rest. And then on Sunday, I start planning the next trip. There are many representations of the human experience out there, none more right or wrong then mine and yours. Personally, I want to experience all of them not to say which one is est or which ones need some work, but to see how others live their days on this piece of rock circling in space.
Ok, enough poetic stuff. I leave for Seattle on Thursday the 24 for my Cousin's wedding. And then Sunday I hope on the plan to Shanghai. The first post will therefore be on Monday the 28th, so look for it then!