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| 0202 |
Innermost Asia : vol.2 |
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make use of the brackish well which is marked by the badly decayed tower of stamped clay and
brickwork known as Bējān-tura.³
Northern-
most range
of Kuruk-
tāgh. On February 18th a long march carried us up the glacis, first very gently sloping, then more
pronounced, and across the crest of the northernmost hill range of the Kuruk-tāgh which bounds
the Turfān basin in this direction (Map No. 28. B, c. 3). An outlier of it, almost completely covered
with masses of fine detritus and sand, was crossed by a saddle appropriately known as Kum-dawān
at an elevation of approximately 1,000 feet. A second saddle about 400 feet higher, rising beyond
a small drainageless basin, gave access to a broad valley which we followed up to its head without
meeting any vegetation. Thence a steep and narrow col had to be crossed at a height of about
2,700 feet, and finally a rapid descent in a winding gorge brought us in the darkness to the ice sheet
marking the salt spring of Achchik-bulak, after a total march of 28 miles (Map No. 28. B. 4). It
was a fitting introduction to the barren Kuruk-tāgh, and the skeletons of sheep left to die here on
their journey from the Tārim to Turfān showed the difficulties presented by this waterless march,
even in the winter when ice from the salt spring can be used. During the summer this most direct
route is practically impossible.
Crossing of
second
Kuruk-tāgh
range. Next morning showed that the ice sheet, which with the abundant scrub around had allowed
us to halt here in comfort, stretched down into a confined winding cañon between steep spurs
furrowed by erosion. This would afford direct access to the Turfān basin from this side were it
not that it is so narrow in places farther down as to be impassable for animals. The onward march
that day led up a big and utterly bare peneplain, formed by the almost complete decay of a succes-
sion of small rocky ridges, and thus on to the crest of a second main range. It was crossed the same
day by the saddle known as Āt-ölgan-dawān at an elevation of 4,300 feet. Patches of snow in
sheltered spots beyond saved us recourse to the water-holes of Achchik-bulak, which were found dry.
This second range of the Kuruk-tāgh, insignificant as it looked on the very gradual ascent from the
north, is yet an important feature in the morphology of the western Kuruk-tāgh. As appears from
the map (No. 28. A, B. 4), it joins up to the north-west with an outlier of the T'ien-shan which runs
down to the south-west of Toksun and is crossed by the Turfān–Kara-shahr route near Ujme-dong.
It forms the water-parting between the Turfān depression to the north and a huge drainageless
basin to the south in the centre of the western Kuruk-tāgh. The deepest portion of this basin is
occupied by an extensive dried-up salt marsh which, as the map shows, extends for a distance of
at least thirty miles from north-west to south-east. In all probability this receives also what occa-
sional drainage there is from the side of the plateaus eastwards, which the route followed by Grum-
Grizhmailo and surveyed by Afrāz-gul crosses between Shaldrang-bulak and Bakri-changche.⁴
Routes
connecting
Lop with
Turfān. It is only along the depression marked by the dried-up salt marsh that vegetation to any
appreciable extent as well as water can be found within this large central basin. We reached the
depression after a total march of 38 miles from Achchik-bulak, after crossing an outlying spur of
the range in a gorge where rock layers with quartz were exposed amidst sandstone and slate. The
narrow belt of loess that stretches along the northern shore of the dry salt marsh supports reed-beds
and tamarisk scrub, and here lie in a line the springs of Ārpishme, Örkash, and Uzun-bulak, near
which the routes from Bējān-tura and Deghar unite. No drinkable water is to be found between
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