The first place of any significance along the river lies about 80km southwest of Wuhan at Chibi . To get here you'll need to take a train to Puqi , a stop on the rail line about two-thirds of the way between Wuhan and Yueyang in Hunan, from where it's a ninety-minute local bus ride.

 

Clearly visible from the river, the small town of CHIBI (Red Cliffs) was the setting for the most important battle of the Three Kingdoms' period, making for an interesting half-day walk from the high street bus stop. It was here in 208 AD that the northern armies of Wei, led by Cao Cao, descended on the combined southern forces of Liu Bei and Sun Quan. Though heavily outnumbered, the southerners had brought two remarkable strategists along - Zhuge Liang and Pang Tong - who took full advantage of Cao's decision to launch a naval assault across the river. Misled by Pang Tong's spies, Cao chained his ships together on the north bank whilst preparing for the attack, and Zhuge Liang - using Taoist magic - created an unseasonal southeasterly wind and sent a flotilla of burning hulks across the Yangzi, completely incinerating Cao's armada and permanently imprinting the colour of flames on the cliffs. The rock face on the southern bank just outside town is carved with the two characters for " chibi ", supposedly by the triumphant Wu general, Zhou Yu .

A flight of steps on the right near the bus stop leads to the whitewashed Feng Chu Temple on Jingluan Hill, where Pang Tong studied military strategy and so conceived the plan that defeated Cao. The path continues up to a stele and the small Yinjiang Pavilion , a former guard post which still commands broad views of the terraced paddy fields below. Back on the high street, bearing left brings you to Nanping Shan , where two stone lions up on the hill flank the entrance to Wuhou Palace and Baifeng Terrace . Four statues here commemorate Zhuge Liang and Liu Bei, along with Liu Bei's oath brothers, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei. Spears, arrowheads and pottery shards in a gloomy museum nearby offer proof that the legends have a historical basis.