
The Yangtze is the third longest river in the world after the Nile and the Amazon.
The Yangtze is called in China merely as Cháng Jiāng (long river in Chinese) reflecting its length and place in China’s history.
A trip down river from Chungking to the Three Gorges to Wuhan has attracted Chinese travellers from time immemorial. For foreigners, the trip is usually upstream from Shanghai.

Here are some books by these travellers.
Five months on the Yang- Tsze documents a voyage upriver from Shanghai to Nanking to Chungking made in 1862. The author Blakiston was an army officer based in Canton during the second Opium war of 1858.

He narrates his voyage describing the local landscape, flora and fauna. There is also an interesting chapter on the Taiping rebels.