The view from the "other" side of the river. Notice the Chinese border fence to the right. This is where they cut the wire to pull us out.
A couple more hours went by when two jeeps pulled up filled with people. They all jumped out, some conversations between them went on, and one drove away leaving a jeep packed with eight people to help. They quickly went to work trying to get us out. First by pushing the car (a pointless move since it was buried so deep), and next by pulling it with the Jeep. Joe had brought an old ratchet strap that he felt would work in place of a tow strap. Will and I wondered if it would work, but Joe was very confident in its strength. Sadly Will and I were right. It broke repeatedly from the strain. We moved on to ropes, which quickly snapped in half as well. Nothing seemed to be working.
Three of the guys then wandered off to the north, following the edge of the river. A few minutes later they came back with a long piece of large-gauge wire. Wire cut from the border fence with China only yards away. Joe and I looked at each other at first with horror—we didn’t think the Chinese government would be happy about that—then with excitement as we realized that it would work perfectly.
They wired it up between our car and theirs, but going the wrong direction. Joe and I tried to explain that we had to cross the river, but they insisted on backing us up instead. Who were we to complain? We needed help and they were there helping.
They revved their engine, and yanked the car out, pulling it on the original bank. Everyone cheered with excitement and we celebrated by handing out candies. Now how do we get to the other side? One of the guys jumped into the car and drove right back into the river, but this time drove inside the river downstream. The water levels were lower, so there were many sandbars to drive along. He drove on until all at once he turned and shot up the hill. Betty struggled, but finally made it. In the end Betty sacrificed the right side of her bumper, a mud flap, a rim, and the front-right fog light.
We tried to explain that we were in a hurry to get Will to safety, but the guys began joy-riding the car up and down the road. We finally got them to give her back when we offered to give them a full can of fuel and some bags of tea in exchange for their help. That was a good $30 pay day, not to mention fuel is a scarce commodity difficult to come by in these parts. We shook hands and away they went—with our fuel AND with our funnel.
SPOT Check from Kernow Krew. We arrived at our next stop. ESN:0-7496576 Latitude:39.2296 Longitude:73.4256 Nearest Location:not known Distance:not known Time:07/21/2009 07:05:41 (US/Pacific) http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=39.2296,73.4256&ll=39.2296,73.4256&ie=UTF8&z=12&om=1
