The improved infrastructure has brought new hope to the life of locals in Yunnan province's Erdaoping village that is surrounded by cliffs on three sides. Photo by Yang Feiyue / China Daily

Residents of a once remote hamlet in Yunnan province are optimistic about their prospects.

Jiang Wenying used to grapple with death every time she wanted to leave home.

She lived in Erdaoping, a small village on a mountain top that is 1,800 meters above sea level and covers an area of 0.3 square kilometers.

The village, in Jiaopingdu town, in the Luquan Yi and Miao autonomous county, in Yunnan province, is surrounded by cliffs on three sides.

It is roughly 28 kilometers away from the nearest town, and the only way out of the village was a sheep lane hugging the mountain.

"I had to press myself against the mountain and hold on to plants when I took the lane," says Jiang.

Most of the lane was only half a meter wide, allowing only one person or a small animal to pass at a time. Some parts of the lane were so narrow that there was not enough room for a person's foot.

One slip could mean a plunge down a steep precipice.

"Before I went to the town only two or three times a year," says Jiang, who married into the village at 19, and has her son and daughter who now work outside the village.