Is it a train? Or is it a bus? Neither, it’s a Ferrobus—    1     unique form of transport found across mountainous regions of South America.

Combining old road bus bodies with rail wheels, these strange-looking machines are a lifeline     2     a lot of remote mountain villages     3     (lack) official road access. Using otherwise     4     (abandon) rail lines—often built in the 19thand early 20th century—Ferrobus routes can     5    (find) in Chile, Bolivia and Colombia, climbing high into the Andes. There are two different Ferrobuses     6     leave on different days.

Ferrobus trips are increasingly popular with tourists wanting to avoid uncomfortable and often     7     (danger) road journeys. Chile’s Gondola Carril from Los Andes to Rio Blanco, north of Santiago, operates     8    (pure) for tourists, but others provide regular, if somewhat unpredictable, transport for     9     (local) and tourists alike.

Bolivia is arguably the center of the Ferrobus world, with at least three routes, although there’s a constant risk of disruption (中断) from floods, rock falls and extreme weather.

Riding a Ferrobus     10     (require) patience and nerve, but you are guaranteed to return with some hair-raising stories to tell your friends.

It is often time-consuming to travel by car or bus in a country     1     size of China. Consequently, high speed trains make good sense.

An early attempt     2     (find) a technological breakthrough for high speed rail travel in China was the Shanghai Maglev (磁悬浮列车), which opened to the public in 2004．As the first     3     (commerce) magnetic-levitation train in the world, it connects Shanghai’s Pudong International Airport with the Shanghai subway system,     4     (travel) a distance of 30 kilometers in 8 minutes.

In 2007, the Chinese Ministry of Railways began joint ventures (风险事业)     5     four companies (from Canada, Japan, France and Germany) to develop high speed rail within China. As Chinese railway technology     6     (mature), the development of the high-speed rail system became     7     (increase) localized, until the all-Chinese Fuxing Hao (Renaissance)     8     (create) and rolled into production in 2017.

China now has nearly 30,000 kilometers of high speed track. Using high speed rail,    9     used to be a 34-hour journey can now be accomplished in just seven to nine hours. While this is still a long journey, it means you can leave in the morning     10     arrive in the afternoon.