In times of adversity, initiative and ingenuity come to the fore.

A university student from Hubei province was one of tens of thousands stranded by snow to try to do it their way.

With highways closed and trains canceled, the student from Changjiang University in Jingzhou tried to ski 200 km to his home city of Wuhan along the snowy highways.

"He hired or borrowed some ski poles, skis and the rest of the equipment, bought some snow gear, packed some water and snacks and got on the highway," Changjiang Daily said.

But he was spotted by police, who picked him up and took him to a bus station. It is not known if he reached home.

Like him, some others stranded on icebound highways decided to take matters into their own hands, or in this case, legs.

After being trapped for four days on a bus going from Jianli in Hubei to Guangzhou, a 52-year-old man surnamed Zhan and his wife started walking at 3 am on Sunday - and a dozen others followed suit.

The group walked 16 hours in the blistering cold toward Guangzhou.

The cold numbed their senses as they trekked through the rain and snow, reported Southern Metropolitan Daily.

The next afternoon, Zhan and his wife reached a town on the Hunan-Guangdong border, where their son was waiting to pick them up. "Their lips were purple from the cold and they were totally exhausted," the son told the newspaper.

Du Dengyong from Shenzhen in Guangdong province also decided to brave the weather. But instead of walking away from stranded vehicles, the 24-year-old set off toward them to reach his girlfriend trapped on a bus along the Beijing-Zhuhai highway.

Du said he covered a long distance in 16 hours in sub-zero weather before he lost contact with his girlfriend when her cell phone ran out of power.

Now recovering from hypothermia in a Chenzhou hostel, Du told the newspaper he will try to find his girlfriend "even if I have to crawl".

His girlfriend may not be doing as badly as he thinks. For some passengers stranded near towns, the days on the road are a good opportunity to brush up their mahjong skills and enjoy hot meals from local restaurants, a bus driver told the paper.

(China Daily 01/31/2008 page1)