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| Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia, 1899-1902 : vol.4 |
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Citation Information
458
EXPLORERS' JOURNEYS IN HIGH TIBET.
mity of the range . . . To our west these hills seem to be lost in a maze of low hillocks, forming the south-western limit of the Ch'u-mar basin.
June 5th. Two miles above our camp we reached the summit of the pass, the ascent all the way being absolutely without difficulty. The descent was even easier than the ascent; the hills to their summits were covered with grass ... The whole range, from north to south, is not over ten miles wide ... After crossing the range we took a due westerly course along the foothills, over a yielding reddish gravel, with an occasional snow-covered hummock and a few grassy hollows. We had now the great Dungburé range in view, about thirty miles to the southward, trending, as well as I could see, east-south-east and west-north-west. This range is an imposing one, with numerous high peaks, not a few covered with snow far down their dark, steep flanks. Between the Koko-shili and the Dungburé are several short spurs of no great height, of red sandstone apparently, and they are parallel to the main ranges; a number of little streams flow on either side of these, all emptying beyond our range of vision into the Nam-ch'utola-muren ... We camped well up on the foothills at a spot where we found good water and plenty of grass . . . The Koko-shili are here not over three hundred feet high, but a few miles to our west they rise to perhaps six hundred feet.
June 7th. We continued over very soft gravel, in which our horses sank to their knees; it was as bad as quicksand; the incessant snowing and raining has turned these hillsides into shaking bogs. We crossed three little rivulets, meeting at the foot of the hills and flowing south-east around one of the short red sandstone ridges in the main valley and parallel to its axis. We then came to a rather dry spot, covered with fine grass and abundant water, where we camped (I 5,70o feet).
June 8th. An inch of snow fell during the night and this morning the ground was softer and more trying on the animals than ever. After a few miles in a westerly direction, we turned south-west, and after crossing some steep red sandstone hills and wading through heavy red sand for several miles we came to the north branch of the Namchutola-muren (or ulan-muren), here about fifteen feet broad and a foot deep . . .
June 9th. We continued in a southwest direction along the foot of a sandstone mesa, which here bounds the basin of the Namchutola, and camped in a hollow at its foot at a point where the valley takes a westerly bend . . . Daily wind and mud have greatly impeded our progress; for the last two or three days we have been obliged to lead our ponies, as it is impossible to ride through the deep, soft mud.
June I oth. We took a south-west by west direction and made for a high snow-covered peak, apparently the culminating point of the mountains to our right and left, and therefore christened by us Namchutola tolh'a or »The Head of the Namchutola». We followed the left bank of the middle branch of the Namchutola, crossing two good-sized affluents, which, though now nearly dry, flow in rock-strewn beds over a quarter of a mile in width. These feeders come from the adjacent hills and cannot be over six or eight miles long; hence one may conclude that at certain seasons of the year the rainfall here must be extraordinarily heavy. To the
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