Yichang overview 宜昌

About Yichang

Its older name, Yiling, appears throughout the city’s history, while the modern waterfront reflects its role as a port and transport centre. The municipal museum gives this river corridor a human context before a dam or gorge excursion. Stay clear about scale: the urban riverbank, Three Gorges Dam and outlying county attractions belong to the same prefecture but require different journeys.

Yichang was historically known as Yiling; the Qin general Bai Qi burned the town in 278 BC, and the Battle of Yiling was fought here in 222 AD during the Three Kingdoms period. Yiling was renamed Yichang in 1735, and after the 1876 Chefoo Convention it was opened as a treaty port. In 1938, as Japanese forces advanced up the Yangtze, more than 100,000 tons of equipment and 30,000 people were evacuated upstream through the Three Gorges to Chongqing within forty days.

The prefecture-level city lies in mountainous western Hubei at the meeting point of the Daba, Wu and Wuling mountain ranges, where the Yangtze (长江) crosses from west to east through the Xiling Gorge, the easternmost of the Three Gorges and the boundary between the river's upper and middle reaches. Tributaries including the Qing River (清江), Huangbai River (黄柏河) and Xiangxi River (香溪河) join the Yangtze within the prefecture, which covers 21,230 square kilometres and has a population of 4.02 million.

Forest covers 49 percent of the prefecture's land area. In the Wufeng Houhe area, more than 370,000 mu (37万亩) of old-growth forest survives from the Quaternary glaciation, including dove trees (珙桐), a species described as a living fossil of the plant world. The prefecture also contains six national forest parks and Houhe National Nature Reserve (后河国家级自然保护区).

What to look for

• The Yangtze waterfront at the eastern end of the gorge region.
• Museum interpretation of Ba, Chu and the changing life of the river corridor.

The surrounding area

A base for the Three Gorges landscape and Three-Gorges Tribe; confirm the actual boat boarding point and transfer.

Location & getting there

Getting to Yichang

Match the railway station or Sanxia Airport shown on your booking with the onward destination. For the museum, use Bailinhe Road in Wujiagang; for a cruise, use the exact boarding pier provided by the operator rather than a generic Yichang river pin.