Today we went to see an ancient dam. The dam was made over 2,000 years ago. It's the oldest dam in the world still working. It's nickname is "Fish Mouth." I think fish mouth is a good name for it because it looks like one. It's formal name is The Dujiangyan Irrigation System.

In ancient times the river used to flood villages every year which created lots of damage. Finally a man named Li Bing decided to split the river into two channels and make a dam to control the flooding. He came up with a plan to make a second channel by creating coals with big fires and then pouring cold water onto the heated rocks to split them apart. He made the dam with big tree trunks, pieces of bamboo, and rocks. This photo is a replica of the old dam.

To get to the dam we had to cross the channel on a suspension bridge. Susan really loved the suspension bridge. Check out the movie we took of her!

In the evening we went to a variety show called "Spitting Fire and Changing Face". People could spit fire and change their masks really fast. We also saw a man who made cool hand shadows. Another man played classical Chinese music on traditional instruments. A woman used puppets to tell a story. Two girls did tricks using Chinese yo-yos. After they did the yo-yos they balanced things like vases and tables on their feet. The last act was a Chinese opera.