Slithering out of darkness and into light

It was pitch black, and my girlfriend Carol and I were stumbling down an uneven stone stairway in the Mount Qixianling National Forest Reserve, in South China's Hainan Province.

The darkness smothered us and the jungle echoed with the yowls, yelps and caws of its nocturnal locals as the critters awoke to prowl their tropical home.

By this point, we had been descending the slope for about 45 minutes and about 15 minutes of this time were spent in total darkness. We had become completely dependent on the bamboo poles we had picked up en route to help us feel our way along the path.

Actually, we had no way of knowing exactly how long we'd been descending the mountainside, because we'd decided against bringing our phones (our only timepieces) so they wouldn't become a liability in the rain forest.

Ironically, that's what got us into this mess. Earlier in the day, we were particularly glad we didn't carry our phones after Carol slipped on a slick stone while crossing a river and plunged in. But as a light source, my phone would have been an invaluable asset.

I was starting to realize that it would take us until sun-up to descend the mountainside at this rate. When we'd scaled Taishan Mountain in May, we had over-packed lugging huge, overstuffed backpacks crammed with four flashlights up its crags for the five-hour ascent. We thought we'd learned our lesson, then. Now, I was even beginning to plot a harebrained torch-making scheme to ensure we didn't have to camp in the rainforest all night.

But I'm not sure which made the idea more unappealing - the perfect absurdity of the notion or the thought of groping for flammable brush in the dark, when trailblazing elsewhere earlier, we'd nearly ambled headlong into the orb web of a giant green spider larger than Carol's hand.

I had no idea what creepy crawlies were venomous here but remembered that we had to wear galoshes to slog through the Costa Rican rain forest, and one of my travel mates went home with botfly larvae embedded in her flesh.

Suddenly, I remembered my camera. I fumbled it from my bag and pressed the ON button. With the light cast by its screen, we could see the steps - and a snake!

I jumped back in alarm and readied my bamboo pole for action. In my panic, I worried that if I were to whack this slithering serpent it might fly up towards my face.

Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, came the floating light of a mobile phone. A man emerged from the darkness, brushed passed the snake and grabbed Carol's hand to lead her down the mountainside.

For the next two hours, we walked with this fellow and a caravan of others who'd also overstayed their welcome at the peak.

We finally arrived at the motoche station. We exchanged a round of hoorays and high-fives with our newfound friends, whom we were seeing for the first time, before going on our way. Our next mission is Zhangjiajie and I have no idea what to expect, but I will tell you one thing: The first things I packed were my mobile phone and flashlight.

(China Daily 10/10/2007 page20)