There is a large wild bamboo forest outside Li Village. The exploration team asked the local Li people to help them cut down dozens of bamboos, select the thick ones and cut them into similar lengths, and the thinner ones were cut into bamboo strips and twisted into ropes to tie up the bamboo rafts.
Wang didn't catch any pheasants, so he took out some of his share of sugar and invited a local carpenter to help him make a raft.
We learned from the local Li people that as the upper reaches gradually enters the mountainous terrain, the river is relatively rugged, and you often have to cross shoals and rapids. In order to facilitate passage, the bamboo raft cannot be made too large, and the width of the raft is controlled to be less than 1.2 meters, similar to Hunan
The simple bamboo rafts used in Jiangxi and other places can carry 5 people on each raft, but they have a lot of equipment, so they ended up making three. The carpenters in the village made some bamboo stools and fixed them on the bamboo rafts. Here comes another one
The icing on the cake is to add a bamboo strip-topped awning to each bamboo raft - the sun is very bright here.
It took less than a day to build the bamboo raft. On the morning of the third day, Li Benqing's malaria had completely recovered. Not only was he conscious, but his appetite had also recovered. He Ping gave him one last medicine as a reinforcement.
Li Benqing was very grateful to this group of strange Han people who cured his illness, and he wished he could give his entire family a pawn as reward. Such cold and fever would occur once a year. Each time, it would take almost a month of hard work like this.
Okay. This time I took the medicine and I was fine within three days. The Han people also said that there would be no recurrence this time. Although I was skeptical, it was absolutely true that the medicine took effect immediately.
But he had nothing else at home except two machetes and a few crossbows. Li Benqing was very embarrassed and insisted on going out to hunt some game for the entertainment, but Xiong Buyou stopped him.
"The game is okay. We have been delayed here for a few days and want to go upriver today. Can you help us find a guide who is familiar with that place?"
"Go upstream?" Li Benqing was a little strange. Even Li people rarely go to this place. If you want to collect medicine, there are things on the mountains upstream, and you can also collect them on the nearby hills.
"Yes, go to Shiluling. Do you know this place?" Xiong Buyou asked.
"I've never heard of it." Li Benqing refused very simply, which made the exploration team suspicious. But according to Mu Min, this person didn't lie - she had been a police officer for many years, so she could tell whether she was lying.
Xiong Buyou did not give up and continued to draw: "If there is a river at the foot of the mountain, and it flows into the Changhua River, it is called Shilu River-"
Li Benqing still shook his head.
Cui Yunhong thought of:
"Ask him if there is a mountain with green stones here?"
The so-called green stone is the copper ore - malachite. The place name Shilu comes from malachite. Because the local Li and Han people in Hainan are used to putting modifiers after the noun when speaking, the so-called Shilu
, in fact, it is "green stone".
Shiluling was first noticed, not because of the iron ore, but because of the copper ore outcrops on the surface here. People have been mining illegally since the Qing Dynasty. Until 1935, the Qiongya Industrial Bureau sent people to Shiluling to investigate the copper mine.
At that time, it was first discovered that the richest mineral reserve in Shilu was iron ore.
"Yes, yes," Li Benqing suddenly realized, "You are going to Yayu Ridge!"
Xiong Buyou didn't know what Yayuling was, but Cui Yunhong knew it, and the contents of the textbook that had been vague for a long time suddenly became clear.
"Yes, yes, it's Yayuling!" Cui Yunhong nodded repeatedly, thinking that he was really confused. The place name Shilu was only used in the Qing Dynasty. It is still the world of the Ming Dynasty.
Brother Wang said: "Uncle, haven't you been to Yayuling before?"
Li Benqing looked troubled. He pondered for a long time, and everyone was waiting anxiously. However, Li Benqing spoke poor Hainanese, and no one except Xiong Buyou could communicate with him.
After a long while, Li Benqing lowered his voice and said, "Are the shopkeepers not hawkers?"
Everyone was shocked when they heard this. Xiong Buyou smiled and said, "Why are we coming to Lidong if it's not to do business?"
Li Benqing said: "Several shopkeepers cured my illness, so I said a few words." He paused, "It's nothing to lead everyone to Yayuling. It's not far from here and the road is not difficult. Although I don't have
I've been there several times and I still recognize the road. I just want to advise a few of you: the gold and silver on Yayu Ridge are all mined by the gods in Qiongzhou Town."
It turns out that there are rumors about treasures in Yayu Ridge many years ago. Even if there are no rumors about gold and silver in the mountains, the copper mine itself is very attractive. So every ten or several decades, as long as Li Dong
When everything was quiet, Han people came together to mine in Yayu Ridge, but no one had ever succeeded. Either the gold and silver could not be mined and the capital was lost, or the mine collapsed and there were casualties, so it had to be abandoned. Over time,
It is said that the mountains here are a major town on the island, an important Feng Shui location, and are protected by gods.
After listening to Li Benqing's gossip, everyone realized that this Shilu Mountain had long been famous. It seems that the so-called Chinese people lack pioneering ideas are pure fart. In an ancient society with low technical level and limited transportation, in this barren mountain
Is it possible for a nation without an adventurous spirit to travel hundreds of miles to mine in the wilderness?
"We are not going to mine gold and silver, we just want to visit Yayuling," Xiong Buyou continued to persuade, "We will leave in a few days."
Li Benqing said: "It's all up to me to take you there. But I ask the shopkeepers to think more carefully about what I say."
But Mr. Wang didn't have these taboos and said with a smile: "Uncle, just go and take them. When you come back, the shopkeepers will reward you with a few kilograms of sugar. You can also use it to get an aunt for me. You don't have to go to the door of Guilong every day."
Singing to find a woman is so scary!"
Li Benqing smiled and said: "You are so young, what nonsense are you talking about? Don't learn it, just learn this!"
The so-called "Guilong" is a special kind of building in Li Village. When several women from the same village reach the age of marriage, they will build a house by themselves near the village and go there to sleep at night. Men who are interested in finding a spouse will go there every night.
"Guilong" and "Lueya" mean that if a woman likes him, she will stay with him. Most people say "Guilong" when they go to "Guilong", which means falling in love. There are also a few people who say "fear too", which means "Guilong".
Refers to two people having sex.
At that time, it was agreed that Li Benqing would lead the way to Yayuling. As for the reward, Li Benqing was originally unwilling to ask for it, so Cui Yunhong gave him a new hook knife, a bottle of liquor and a few kilograms of sugar. Li Benqing liked it very much, so he accepted it.
Already.
After taking care of his initial recovery, the expedition team rested for another day in Li Village. The exploration team has not been idle in the past few days. They roughly conducted a survey of the resources around Li Village and drew a topographic map. In terms of resources, in addition to the saponin forest,
, a small-scale tin mine was also discovered nearby, but unfortunately the transportation is inconvenient and there is no mining value.
Early the next morning, everyone took a bamboo raft to go upriver. Mr. Wang stayed in Li Village to take care of the goods and luggage they left behind. Everyone packed lightly and only brought necessary equipment and camping tools. Li Benqing himself
He brought dry food and salt, and carried a crossbow. Mu Min curiously asked him if all the arrows he brought were poisoned.
"No, curare wood is hard to find. Even if you find it, the local Han people are not allowed to use it." Li Benqing gestured. The Han people he mentioned were the officials in Changhua City.
I heard that curare wood is hard to find, so several camping enthusiasts were a little uninterested. However, everyone was very interested in his crossbow and took turns playing with it. The structure of this crossbow is very simple, and its effective range does not exceed 50 meters. No wonder Li Benqing
He said that he mainly uses this to shoot crossbows in places where wild beasts are infested. However, he rarely uses crossbow arrows for hunting - if he wants to sell furs, the holes pierced by crossbow arrows are worthless. Li Benqing mainly relies on digging traps and setting up various kinds of hunting traps.
All kinds of traps. Several hunting enthusiasts in the exploration team took turns to exchange relevant experiences with him on the bamboo raft. After most of the day, they all understood the general meaning of the talk and gestures. The relationship also became a lot warmer.
.
Li Benqing caught quite a lot of animals. Jiang Muzhi, who was in charge of biological data collection in the exploration team, soon learned from his description that there were ferrets, badgers, otters, large and small civets, civets and other economically valuable animals in the local area.
, as for hares, wild boars and the like, they are quite widely distributed. The most surprising thing is that there are also black bears in the local area.
"This thing is not easy to mess with -" Li Benqing shook his head, "It can run fast and can climb trees."
But this resource is of little use to travelers. They don't need bear skins for hats, and the use of bear bile is not on the agenda. Relatively speaking, deer skins are more useful.
Li Benqing said that there are two kinds of deer in the local area, one is large and the other is small. The exploration team soon figured out that the big one is sambar deer and the small one is bark deer. Both kinds of deer are of great economic value.
Because there are very few opportunities for forestry professionals to conduct field animal inspections, an experienced hunter like Li Benqing is the best investigation target. What is commendable is that he can describe the characteristics of every hunted animal quite accurately.
Come on, this makes the judgment of traveling people a lot easier.
Li Benqing saw that they had taken a notebook and kept writing down his words. He was surprised and proud at the same time. He couldn't understand why these Han people would take these things so seriously and write them down. Yes.
Their purpose of coming added to the mystery.
Because it is the dry season, the water volume is not large and the current is very gentle. It is not difficult to use a bamboo pole to paddle a boat upstream. However, we often have to pass through rocky shoals, and everyone often has to get off the bamboo raft to push across. In some places, the rocky beaches are exposed to the water.
You still have to carry the bamboo raft over to continue moving forward.
As the bamboo raft went up, the exploration team carefully observed the changes in the main channel and the nearby tributaries, and kept recording the surrounding topography and vegetation types. The trees on the shore were sparse, but the shrubs and grass were dense. The bamboo raft would disturb the grass from time to time.
There are birds and some unknown small animals. There are no signs of human activities on both sides of the strait - Li Benqing said that the adventurous Han miners did not leave many traces here.
At three or four o'clock in the afternoon, the bamboo raft finally arrived at a place later known as Sancha River Town. Of course, this place is still a barren grassland. The water flow became very shallow, and the bamboo raft scraped the bottom of the river more than once.
Sand and gravel. As for the Shilu River, this tributary of the Changhua River cannot be used by boats at all now, and can only barely submerge people's ankles.
The exploration team decided to abandon the ship and land here, and everyone worked together to drag the bamboo rafts ashore. According to Li Benqing, they walked upstream along the river and walked another fifty or sixty miles to get there. Because it was getting late,
Everyone camped here to rest and prepare to set off again the next morning.
The exploration team set up a bonfire in the camp and ignited many mosquitoes smoked by artemisia annua. In order to avoid suspicion, the expedition team did not take out any equipment that was too eye-catching. However, their matches, sleeping bags and dry food still aroused Li Benqing's attention.
Strong interest - especially matches. Dinner was dry food from the grassland series. Li Benqing ate rice cakes for the first time and said they were delicious. Everyone gave him a lot of their share. Li Benqing made bamboo tube rice in return.
After adding a little salt and lemongrass, the bamboo tube rice tastes appetizing.
When they were about to go to bed at night, they heard a suspicious roaring sound. Thinking of what Li Benqing said about black bears, many people became nervous. In order to ensure a safe sleep, Cui Yunhong prepared the guns and lit a bunch of more fires.
The fire was strong, and everyone took turns on duty, constantly adding fuel in large quantities - hay and branches of small shrubs were everywhere.
The next day, they all got up at five o'clock in the morning, ate breakfast in a hurry and hit the road again. Everyone continued to walk upstream along the river, making twists and turns, relying on the compass, map and Li Benqing's guidance, and then walked again.
After walking for fifty or sixty miles, they finally reached the foot of the mountain at sunset, where clear river water slowly flowed from a valley in front of them.
"This is Yayu Ridge." Li Benqing pointed.
Cui Yunhong knew where he was. He found a compass and looked at the setting sun. The compass pointer pointed to the southwest. Looking in the direction of the pointer, he saw a reddish-brown mountain peak. He nodded. This area
It should be the famous Hainan Shilu magnetite.
Everyone was excited, Shilu Iron Mine! This is China's largest open-pit rich iron mine, with nearly 300 million tons of magnetite reserves with an average iron content of more than 42%! It is also accompanied by cobalt, copper, nickel, silver, sulfur, and white clouds.
Stone and other ores. If coal were not produced here, Shilu would be a natural large-scale coal-iron complex base.
Cui Yunhong was so excited that she almost fell down. She was about to climb up the mountain with her equipment. Everyone hurriedly stopped her, saying that it was getting dark now and it was not safe to climb the mountain. It would not be too late to go tomorrow.
They set up camp next to the stream. There was no talk the whole night. The next day, Cui Yunhong led the team and formed a small team of 5 people to go up the mountain. The remaining people stayed at the camp.
Yayu Ridge is not high, and the mountain is not steep. The overall vegetation on the hillside is still a savanna landscape, with a large area of thatch as tall as a person. Although it is better than a tropical rain forest, climbing is quite difficult. Fortunately,
With Li Benqing, an old hunter, leading the way, he would choose a route with sparse vegetation.