File:Ruins of desert Cathay - personal narrative of explorations in Central Asia and westernmost China (1912) (14596623247).jpg

Identifier: ruinsofdesertcat01stei (find matches)
Title: Ruins of desert Cathay : personal narrative of explorations in Central Asia and westernmost China
Year: 1912 (1910s)
Authors: Stein, Aurel, Sir, 1862-1943 Archaeological Survey of India
Subjects:
Publisher: London : Macmillan
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

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the valleybelow, owing to bends caused by the spurs descending tothe glaciers edge. So after indicating a camping-place at the last plot ofcoarse grass below the terminal moraine, I set out withMusa, whom his Chitrali descent and his youth seemedto mark out for climbing, and a few very unwillingTaghliks to ascend the glacier as far as time and con-ditions would permit. The Surveyor remained behindto nurse a bad cold and—the stiff joints resulting fromthe previous days rock-scrambling. The big glaciersnout rising before us showed a crescent-shaped ice wall,over half a mile across and fully 200 feet high, exposedand yet almost dark with fine detritus (see the panoramain Plate n., taken farther up). Over the huge terminalmoraines in which the snout was embedded, and whichimperceptibly merged with the debris masses overlyingthe flanks of the ice wall, access could have been gainedto the crest. But the previous days experience hadshown me how greatly an advance on the glacier itself 188
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PANORAMIC VIEW OF END PORTION OF OTRUGHUL GLACIER, AT HEAD OF NISSA VALLEY, TAKEN FROM DETRITUS SLOPE FACING THE WESTERN FLANK OF THE (ILACIER. The foreground in centre and on left shows the glacier flank completely covered with debris masses of moraines (seethe precipitous rock-spur past which the route of our ascent on the glacier lay (sei p. 188). The ice wall behind is exposed, darkened with fine detritus. On extreme right is seen the foot ofi. p. 189). The panorama was taken at an elevation of arc. 14,800 feet. cH.xvi ALONG THE LATERAL ICE WALLS 189 was likely to be impeded by its covering masses of rockand detritus. So I decided to try a route along itswestern edge, where the main drainage had cut itself away between the lateral ice wall of the glacier and thesteep boulder-strewn slopes rising above it. To crossthis stream of greyish ice - water where it debouchednear the snout was not easy on yaks, even so early inthe day, and the apprehension seemed justified that bythe time o

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