In October of 1934, the First Front Army of the Chinese Soviet Republic, led by the inexperienced command of Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, was on the brink of annihilation by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's troops. However, the Communists escaped in a circling retreat to the west and north, travelling some 12,500 kilometres over 370 days. Moreover, the route passed through some of the most difficult terrain of western China. Ezra [above] recreated at least a small snippet of that long march in the Douglas-Apsley National Park.