Some courageous maintenance workers took great risks on Thursday as they replaced wooden planks along the famous cliffside plank path at Huashan Mountain in northwest China's Shaanxi Province in preparation for the summer tourism season.

The path, located 2,000 meters above sea level and with a drop of nearly 800 meters, is composed of steel rod ladders, toeholds carved out of the cliff and narrow wooden planks.

It is very dangerous to walk on the short and narrow path since there is nothing but wooden planks for tourists to walk on and a rail of chains for them to grasp.

It is therefore especially demanding a job for the maintenance workers to remove worn-out planks and install new ones. All seven of the workers doing the job are natives of the area and have been familiar with the conditions of the precipitous mountains since they were children.

One of the main difficulties these workers face is how to bring the new anti-corrosive wooden planks, which are much heavier than the old ones, down in place for the changing.

As one of China's Five Great Mountains, Huashan Mountain is well-known for its precipitousness