Itanagar, Dec. 1: Thirteen Czech adventurers who went “missing” yesterday in the turbulent waters of the Siang on two rafts, surfaced at their Pasighat destination by road this morning after giving the administration a jittery night.

Though language barrier — none of them was fluent in English — made it difficult for police to piece together their tale, the adventurers managed to convey that they wandered for two days in Palsi and Dite Dime, 150km from Pasighat, after losing their way in the waters near Jambo.

They probably walked to Balek yesterday with directions from villagers, spent the night there and reached Pasighat early this morning.

The team, comprising 11 men and two women, had set sail from Tuting in Upper Siang district on Wednesday with a rafting team of the Indian Air Force.

While the air force team reached Pasighat on schedule yesterday afternoon, the Czech team went “missing”.

It takes about four to five days for a team to sail from Tuting to Pasighat, battling rapids called the “Karbo Killer” en route. Pasighat is 140km from Tuting by road and 220km on the river route.

Superintendent of police of East Siang district S.K. Jain confirmed that the foreigners had lost their way in Jambo while negotiating the strong currents of the Siang, a tributary of the Brahmaputra.

He said the team, comprising M. Telceck, J. Paveck, P. Novotny, S.S. Kozakova, R. Azik, A. Beboh, P. Branpal, K. Karl, M. Kodick, H. Zamakova, M. Roztoky, G. Sbehla and T. Srosticek, left Pasighat immediately on arrival. They did not reveal where they were headed. The two blue rafts on which they had set sail were brought back to Pasighat by local people from Balek.

Jain said unlike in previous expeditions, the rafters did not inform the district administration about the trip.

Shaukat Sikand, the secretary of the Delhi-based Indian Rafting Foundation, which organised the expedition jointly with the air force, said he registered a missing case with Pasighat police station last night.