IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
| |||||||||
|
| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia, 1899-1902 : vol.4 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Citation Information
464
EXPLORERS JOURNEYS IN IIIGII TIBET.
July 2nd. We took a south-south-west course parallel to a short range of mountains of no great height on our right. The sandy plain over which we travelled is traversed by a number of small streams flowing, some westward, into a lake at some distance to the west, the others emptying into little pools at the foot of the hills. From the low red sandstone hill on which we have camped, I can see that the hills to the south of Chib chang ts'o (the lake of Kétén gol) run west as
far as the eye can reach.
July 3rd. We travelled to-day about twenty miles for the greater part of the time in a nearly due southerly direction; crossing two ranges of hills projecting from those to our east, and running due east and west; the stream between them flowed westward. These hills appeared to be composed mostly of shale of a yellowish colour. The ground under our feet was of fine gravel, and very little grass was anywhere to be seen. Two miles before making camp we crossed a col, the ascent to which was quite long; I made it out to be 16,500 feet above sea-level. From where we have stopped, a couple of hundred feet below the summit on the south side of the pass, we command an extensive view, but I can see nothing before us but mountains and jagged walls of rock projecting from their summits.
July 4th. During the night it rained hard from ten to eleven o'clock, and then for three hours it sleeted. The storm, which was accompanied by thunder and lightning, came as usual from the west. After crossing a little stream flowing westward, we entered to-day a broad valley. At its southern end the stream flowing through it bends abruptly westward and enters a narrow gorge. The upper part of this valley is marked by a curious ridge of rocks, probably limestone, running east and west, and which, from a distance, might be taken for a line of old gnarled and dead trees, so sharp are their outlines. In this valley we came again on the highroad followed by those going to the northern salt mines, and we had to make up our minds to follow it, for no other route led out of the valley. We had to camp near a lakelet on the top of the pass at the south end of the valley . . .
July 5th. The summit of the pass turned out to be about three miles beyond our camp (I 6,000 feet), but only a few hundred feet higher than it. We rode to-day in a south-south-easterly direction over hills and across dales all trending nearly due east and west, all the water flowing westward and emptying into a large lake some six or eight miles to the west of our route. We also saw from one of the cols we crossed, and some fifteen miles east of it, a large sheet of water . . . After about twenty-two miles over a fairly easy trail we came to the mouth of a little valley, whence we could see, some twenty-five miles to the south, a range of dark hills running east and west, but nowhere any signs of human habitations.
July 6th. Our route lay south-south-east over a gently undulating plain, the streams which crossed it running south-west by west to empty into the big lake we saw yesterday. This lake is called the Yirna ts'o, and is a soda lake. At 2 p. m. we came to a river flowing westward in a broad flat bed of mud and sand. The name of this river is Tsacha tsang-bo ch'u. On some European maps it is figured (but too far north) as the Zacha Sangpo or Yargui tsumbu. The latter name looks as if it might be intended as a transcription of Jirna tsang-po, »the river of the Yirna (ts'o)». We had great trouble in getting across. The water flowed
ti
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Copyright (C) 2003-2019 National Institute of Informatics and The Toyo Bunko. All Rights Reserved.