Chapter 16: Preparations Need to be Made Before Entering the Mountains Li Long didn't know what the villagers thought of him now, but he didn't care. After getting on the carriage and trying to drive 500 meters, he became proficient. I did similar work in my previous life. Although Li Jianguo was one of the first people in the team to be able to afford a tractor, in the years before buying the tractor, the main means of transportation for the family was a donkey cart. Li Long can not only drive a donkey cart, but also ride a donkey. Before he passed away in his previous life, he had thought about raising donkeys. After all, donkeys are less likely to get sick, are easy to raise, and have an increasingly higher selling price. "Brother Long, when did you learn to drive a horse-drawn carriage?" Tao Daqiang said enviously while sitting on a bundle of straw on the carriage. "That's nothing." Li Long said as he sat on the carriage frame, "The road is so flat, and the horses in our team are docile. As long as we don't stimulate them and keep an eye on them from time to time, they will move forward." Of course, it sounds simple, but it's not that simple in reality. It's just that Li Long doesn't think it's necessary to explain it in such detail. There were few people on the road all the way to the village. The brims of the two men's hats, their eyebrows, and the newly grown hair on their lips were all covered with a layer of white frost. The sun rose and the temperature rose slightly, but Li Long felt his feet were numb from the cold. He got off the carriage and drove along the road towards the county.
The road from the township to the county is much better, with trucks passing by, and the road surface is relatively wide, and you can occasionally see donkey dung and horse dung balls. Li Long remembers that when he was walking to the county in winter, he would kick these things out of boredom. The best ones were camel dung balls, which were completely round and could roll a long way with a kick. Donkey dung and horse dung balls were both oval and flat, and they would roll in irregular paths when kicked. Then I saw an old man picking up manure with a dung basket on his back. This is rare. Because of the large land area in northern Xinjiang, chemical fertilizers have been widely used. Li Long used to see people picking up manure in his hometown, but he has rarely seen it here. When the carriage arrived at the county, both the horses and the people were already white. Li Long found a purchasing station, drove the carriage to the side of the road, and pulled out a few handfuls of grass from the carriage for the horses to eat. He told Tao Daqiang: "Da Qiang, you stay here and watch over the carriage. I'll go in and see what the skin of the water rat is worth." "Okay." Tao Daqiang nodded vigorously. He felt that he was finally of some use. Li Long pushed the door and entered the purchasing station with the bag rolled up with water rat skin, and saw a middle-aged man sitting on a chair reading a newspaper behind the counter. The man was wearing a blue Mao suit, his hair parted in a 4:6 split style, and looked quite energetic - just like a cadre of that era. There was a stove in the purchasing station. The fire was burning brightly and making a rumbling sound. Li Long knew without even looking at him that the stove must be full of coal - what a luxury! "Comrade, I want to ask if you will accept this thing." Li Long said as he took out the skin of the water rat and placed it on the counter. Chen Hongjun looked Li Long up and down, then stood up slowly, took a look at the leather, and asked: "Do you know what this skin is?" The purchasing station has basically no business in the winter, so the people here work in shifts, one person per day, just like being on duty. Finally someone came to deliver something, and he didn't seem too cold. "Water rat skin. Oh, this thing is also called muskrat, right?" "Yes. You know a lot, young man." Chen Hongjun nodded, touched the leather, picked it up and looked at it, and asked, "New leather?" "Well, I took it out yesterday. It was an accident. This thing is easier to get in the spring. Now I just say I'm lucky." "The leather is good. I'll give you five dollars for this one." Chen Hongjun put the leather away. "If you have it later, I'll charge you this price - you should know that this is a high price." It is indeed a high price, and it will take another two years for the price to rise to ten yuan per ticket. "Okay." Li Long was already very satisfied. After taking five dollars, Li Long left the purchasing station. He felt a little regretful that he should have let Tao Daqiang come in to warm up.
But there is still work to do, and there is still a chance. "How much did you sell it for?" Tao Daqiang asked immediately when he saw that the bag in Li Long's hand was much thinner. "Five dollars." Li Long gestured and said with a smile: "Let's go to the department store and buy some food before we go." "So expensive!" Tao Daqiang's eyes lit up immediately, "If I could get a few more..." "Spring, maybe. The lake is frozen now, so you'd be lucky if you could get one." Li Long collected the grass that the horse hadn't finished eating and put it on the cart, then hurried to the department store. When they arrived at the department store, Li Long took out the five-yuan steelworker's note and said to Tao Daqiang: "Da Qiang, go in first and buy a kilogram of sesame cakes and two bricks of tea. Then warm up for a while and come out to replace me." "I...I don't dare to go." Tao Daqiang stuttered when he heard that he was asked to go buy something. "Brother Xiaolong, you should go." "I let you go so you can warm up. We can't go in at the same time. You don't need to bargain for this thing. Just pay and take the thing." Li Long urged him twice before Tao Daqiang took the money and walked in hesitantly. In less than five minutes, he came out with a bag of things for Li Long: "Brother Long, I bought it. One sesame cake for yuan, brick tea for 90 yuan, and this is the change." Li Long took the money, put the things on the carriage, and went back in. The department store is much larger than the purchasing station. It has three floors. The first floor sells food, cigarettes, alcohol, household needlework, etc. Li Long took out money and bought another kilogram of sesame cakes. After thinking for a while, he bought a bag of salt. He walked around, warmed himself up, and walked out. Tao Daqiang was circling beside the carriage. Li Long untied the rope that tied the horse and said: "Let's go, into the mountains now!" "Okay!" Tao Daqiang also got on the carriage. Li Long waved the whip, and the carriage quickly rushed into the mountains. More than an hour later, they arrived at Qingshuihe Commune. "Brother Long, does your co-worker live here?" "Yeah." Li Long said vaguely, "But let's not go there yet, let's go straight into the mountains." Tao Daqiang didn't ask why Li Long went directly into the mountains. He just took what Brother Long said as the truth. If ordinary people come here and want to go into the mountains, they have to ask the locals, otherwise they may not know the way into the mountains. But Li Long had been into the mountains many times in his previous life and was very familiar with the road. He drove the carriage past Qingshuihe Commune, then turned onto a small road, and after several turns, he entered the mountain pass. Further ahead, although there were still tire tracks, the snow was thicker and it was more difficult for the horses to move. Li Long and Tao Daqiang both got off the cart, and when they encountered thick snow, Tao Daqiang pushed the cart from behind. There are several Nanshan Mountains. The outermost layer that ordinary people see is a dirt mountain with basically no vegetation. Only after walking two layers of mountains inward will sparse shrubs appear. Going further in, the mountains become continuous, with grasslands, pine forests, bushes, etc. on the mountains. By the time Li Long drove the carriage to the mountain with a pine forest, another hour had passed. He stopped panting and began to look for his target. Soon, behind the pine forest, he saw what he was looking for: the winter den. (End of this chapter)
