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Woman recounts ordeal

Coeur d'Alene Press | UPDATED 13 years, 3 months AGO
| September 18, 2012 9:00 PM

TWIN FALLS (AP) - A Canadian woman found on the verge of starvation after seven weeks in the Nevada wilderness last year told an Idaho church congregation she had prepared herself to die the same day hunters came across her stranded van.

The Times-News reports Rita Chretien spoke Sunday at the First Church of the Nazarene in Twin Falls. She was found weak but alive last May in the rugged mountains of northeastern Nevada, near the Idaho line.

Her husband didn't make it out alive.

Chretien, who survived on trail mix, candy and water from a stream, told the Idaho church that after 49 days, her strength was almost gone and she thought she was going to have a heart attack when she wrapped herself in a blanket and prepared to die.