UP HILLS OF WATER

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 628, 3 April 1929, Page 11

UP HILLS OF WATER

EXCITING JOURNEY ON YANGTSE RAPIDS AND 1.000-FT CUFFS Graphic details of a live weeks' journey up the Yangtse River from Shanghai come In a letter to friends from an Australian girl, Mrs. Harold Anderson, of Chengtu, whose husband. Dr. Anderson, is a Professor of Medicine at the West China University. “Coming from Ichang to Chungking,” she writes, "we were in a convoy of seven boats, with one of the new American gunboats so far ahead that she couldn't have been the least use to us in case of trouble- We dropped so far behind that the third night out we had to tie up alone in a bad part of the river, where robbers abound. The officers had had a 13 hours’ day, so the passengers offered to keep watch ail night. It was most dramatic to look out in the middle watches and see figures with torches slipping about shooting rays of light into the pitchy blackness. Fighting Swirling Stream “Added to which the river is so wicked in that part, with its swirling waters and its terrific rapids. The boat simply had to fight its way up with every chance of rubbing off a rudder on some hidden rock. The cliffs on each side are immense. You look up a clear 1.000 feet in some places, and feel like an ant in comparison. “When we reached Chungking, we spent several days debating whether we should go overland, 10 days quicker, or by water, to Chengtu. However, with all our baggage and books, it would have taken ten men to get the four of us across, so we decided to go by the river. This meant a five days’ journey by motor-boat for another 400 miles. We spent the entire time in our little six by six cabin, sitting on six-inch stools until our knees creaked! “At Suifu we boarded native boats —one apiece for each family—with all our luggage stowed away below, the crew on the front platform and the captain and our servant behind. We had a bathroom made out of matting, a pantry, bedroom and sitting room, with doors made of bed mats, which, could go up or down according to fancy. The old captain was a melancholy poor thing, and wailed away at the trackers night and day. When our rope broke in a rapid his voice would have outdone King Lear mourning his misfortunes. “Rapids are tremendously exciting. The river narrows and pours through its channel in a torrent. The boat has literally to be pulled up a hill of water. The trackers get down on all fours and dig their toes in. The pole man in front lies down to his poling, and you hang there poised, waiting to see which will win—men or river.