MOUNTAINS OF SINKIANG

H. W. TILMAN

To travel about 16,000 miles for the sake of climbing two mountains shows at least a desperate ardour for mountaineering. And since we failed on both it may be thought also to show a desperate lack of skill. My plan was to meet Ship ton at the end of June at Urumchi, the capital of Sinkiang, lying about 1,000 miles east of Kashgar where Shipton was H.B.M. Consul-General.

Early in June I went by air to Shanghai. To reach Central Asia from Europe by way of Shanghai may sound a little like Chesterton's 'the night we went to Birmingham, by way of Beachy Head', but it is the quickest way. Too much noise, heat, dirt, and a population badly in need of decimation, were the impressions I had of Shanghai; and even at the rate of three million to the pound Chinese dollars did not go very far. The price of everything except air travel kept well abreast or even ahead of the rapidly falling exchange; but it was odd that; one could fly to Nanking for less than the price of a tin of tobacco.

I continued by air to Lanchow in North China on the Hwang-Ho (Yellow River), a hop of about 1,200 miles, and for the remaining 1,1oo miles to Urumchi I travelled by Post bus, the journey taking twelve days including four non-running days. Knowing nothing of Chinese I took care to write down phonetically five essential words, that is, words for food, but this forethought availed me nothing, for my version of the words conveyed nothing at all to anyone, so that at times life wore a pretty harsh aspect. The Chinese are commendably serious about food and cooking and it was maddening to think of all the carefully prepared, bizarre, and possibly pleasing dishes I might have sampled had I been able to ask for them.

The road runs through what is called the Kansu corridor with the high Richthofen range to the south and desert to the north. Near Suchow it passes through the remains of the Great Wall and shortly after it enters the Gobi Desert. Half-way across the desert is the boundary between Kansu and Sinkiang and on the other side is the oasis of Hami. Hami is known for its melons, which used to be sent to the Imperial Court at Peking, and for the tombs of its princes which, with their domes of green glazed tiles and blue and white tiled walls, are still worth seeing. By driving most of the night as well as the day we reached Urumchi, which the Chinese call Tihwa, in another two days. On the way one passes through the Turfan Depression which is a rich and very hot oasis several hundred feet below sea-level, remarkable for its system of underground irrigation. Nearing Urumchi I had my first view of Bogdo Olo and thought it looked decidedly hostile.

Shipton and I were the grateful guests of the American Consul and his wife (Mr. and Mrs. Paxton), for the new British Consul had not then arrived. Three days later, 10th July, we left by truck for Toukan, a village on the north side of the mountain, where we collected some ponies. Through pine-clad foothills we climbed to the lovely lake and monastery of Ten Sher (6,000 feet) and there embarked in a crank and leaky boat for our passage across the lake. The ponies went round and having met them we camped with some Kazaks at about 8,300 feet. These Kazaks are pastoral nomads of Moslem religion and Mongolian appearance. There are some half a million of them in the north-east corner of Sinkiang and about three million of them in the Soviet Republic of Kazakstan. As subjects they are disliked by the Chinese on account of their independent ways—a euphemism for a tendency to revolt. To our party they were hospitable and helpful but on the two occasions when I encountered Kazaks alone and unannounced I was threatened, once with a rifle and once with a whip, so in my opinion the Chinese have substantial grounds for their dislike.

Upon crossing the 12,ooo-foot Gurban pass we found ourselves looking across a wide glacier of smooth dry ice to the north face of Bogdo Ola. The main mountain consists of a ridge some 2½ to 3 miles long crowned by three upstanding peaks, West, Central, and East, the last being the highest by several hundred feet. The group was surveyed in 1904 by Mer/bacher who credited the East peak with 6,512 metres or 21,350 feet. To our weak minds such a height in such a latitude about that of north Italy—was quite excessive, but we took comfort from the results of a Swedish geological party which had mapped the region in 1939, giving the East peak the more reasonable figure of 18,000 feet. Strangely enough our two altimeters agreed with Merzbacher's heights up to 14,000 feet, nevertheless, we think his heights for the three summits are 1,000 metres too much.

We pitched camp in a snow-storm, the Kazaks and their ponies departed unreluctantly, and four of us remained to contemplate the distasteful scene. Besides Shipton and me there were Lhakpa, his Sherpa factotum, once an Everest porter but now obese, and a reputedly tough Hunza whom we called Hill Billy. As seen in profile an arete, descending from the East peak to a high easily reached snow col, offered a short, steep, and not exactly alluring route to our goal. We felt that we were neither physically nor mentally fit for what looked like serious business so we resolved to devote some days to reconnaissance. We were pretty certain that a less exacting way would be found; if not, perhaps after a few days of exercise and acclimatization we should be less daunted by the severity of this arete.

Our first day we spent walking gently to a snow col (13,700 feet) lying below the higher col already noted. We learnt nothing fresh; from that much closer the arete appeared no easier, and we returned in sleet, hail, and thunder to grapple with domestic troubles. Lhakpa was sick, the tent leaked copiously, and our home-made copy of Merzbacher's map had, like the Dutchman's anchor, been left behind. More, and worst of all, the primus refused to work, and very soon the inside of the tent was a murky hell of mud, snow, and soot, fitfully lit by flashes of lurid language.

Two days later, having done what we were too idle to do the first day, that is, to cross the low col and explore to the east, we thought we had found a way to our peak by the long east ridge which connects the East peak with a distant outlier. This ridge was defended on the north side by hanging glaciers so that our narrowing hopes now centred on its south side. Although the mountain is by no means vast—if the east ridge did not intervene one could walk round it in a long day—I felt that if we moved to the south side we should not return and that before going we ought to rub our noses on the north-east arete to convince ourselves that it was as bad as it looked. Shipton's view was that of Moses: 'Ye have encompassed this mountain long enough, turn ye southwards.’ In fact he thought we had wasted our time and should have made a wide reconnaissance in the first place. At the inquiry subsequently held to decide whether it was to lack of competence, courage, judgement, or all three, that we owed our failure, I maintained that in the Himalaya an initial strategic reconnaissance is useless since few routes can be safely approved or discarded without actual trial. Only detailed reconnaissance is of value.

While waiting for the ponies to come up I made a quick dash down the Gurban valley to the south where I found an easy pass eastwards to the Chigo glacier and imagined I had found a way up the East peak. I was chased most of the way back by a Kazak with a rifle which he refrained from using. Ammunition, I suppose, was scarce.

We moved camp to below this pass, preparatory to taking a camp to the east ridge, for in clearer weather and from higher up Shipton had found my East peak to be false. From the Chigo glacier an easy snow slope led to the east ridge. This was cheering, but looking at the ridge from this side we began to have doubts about our route. However, we had now no more unexplored but comforting possibilities in hand. Having condemned the north-east arete without a trial this was our last hope.

By the time Lhakpa, who had been left behind sick, had rejoined, Hill Billy had taken to his bed. We suspected, probably unjustly, that his illness arose from the revolting aspect of the east ridge upon which we meditated assault, but he need have had no cause for alarm either on his behalf or ours, for at that time the last vice with which we could be charged was temerity. Together with Lhakpa and some help from a yak we carried a camp to the head of the Chigo. As there were about 2,000 feet to climb to the ridge we expected to make only one carry, but at the start we were hindered by several hundred feet of bare ice-rough, but not rough enough to stand on without nicking steps—and Lhakpa was not much help. At 3 p.m. we sent him down and two hours later, by when we were pretty shagged, we dug a platform for the tent.

Next day, in two lifts and on good hard snow, we completed the carry to the ridge. The height was about 15,250 feet. Even 011 the way up it had become plain that the proposed route was beyond our powers, but we had neither the resolution to persevere nor to cut our losses and go down forthwith. We should have had to carry another camp along the ridge, which was knife-edged, corniced, and ill-suited for a laden party, and the way to the summit bristled with difficulties well above our low standard. Nevertheless, the situation of our camp was very grand and had we toiled up merely for that and the view the effort had been worth while. From our tent door the slender, sinuous ridge stretched away horizontally to an invisible gap, whence it leapt up to merge into the precipitous rock and ice of the main mass. To the north, where our tent hung upon the lip of space, the eye ranged unimpeded to the black and golden wastes of the Gobi; while to the south, beyond the broad white ribbon of the Chigo glacier, the tawny Asian landscape seemed as infinite as the pale sky.

From dusk that night until dawn a very violent wind blew. Our tent had been on Everest in 193B and considering its age and the fury of the gusts our surprise that it held together equalled our gratitude. Expecting the worst we slept w^rith mittens, Balaclavas, and windproofs on. Next day, which was fine and calm, we devoted to climbing eastwards along the ridge to a small peak of about 16,500 feet. Apart from some heavy cornices, the ridge afforded an easy and enjoyable climb. Is it, by the way, a sign of decadence, old age, or merely sanity to couple enjoyment with ease? I like to think that it is sanity, for though in climbing there are moments of Tearful joy' I believe that for most of us the enjoyment of difficulty and danger is largely retrospective.

So grand was the site of our camp that we were in no hurry to leave it, but just before sundown a few random gusts heralded the approach of another night of anxiety. With that prompt energy and decision which hitherto, when it was a question of going up, we had lacked, we packed and started down carrying everything. On the icy part we lowered the loads, rope's length by rope's length, until near the end Shipton's impatience got the better of his judgement. We were not so near the bottom as that. Our bulging rucksacks did stop, eventually, badly split, soaked in paraffin and lighter by the loss of several pounds of sugar. We made camp in the dark, the primus would not work, and we supped dryly on bread in frosty silence. The rucksack affair seemed an obvious topic of conversation, but one that only a very determined philosopher could have discussed dispassionately.

Such was the inglorious end of our first round with Bogdo. We climbed another small peak from the Qurban valley, but we had neither time, inclination, nor paraffin for an attempt by the northeast arete, the off-hand rejection of which we now bitterly regretted. As the fish that gets away is always the biggest, so the route one does not try is always the best. We returned to Urumchi by the main road south of the mountain on 28th July, and a week later, by a curious conjunction of circumstances and the American Consul's desire for ice, we were once more in the Gurban valley. The intervening week had been wondrously fine and hot and the north-east arete, which we eyed fondly and self-accusedly from Urumchi, was evidently in perfect condition. Shame, remorse, and self-respect all urged us to go back when the fleeting opportunity occurred.

By means of an American truck we reached the Kazak yurts in the Gurban valley on the second day, by which time the weather broke. Having dutifully hewn out from the Sud glacier five yak loads of ice and dispatched them, we went on. It was raining and blowing, and the mountain was well plastered with snow, so that there was no incentive but curiosity to urge us on. The prize, if it had ever been within reach, had been snatched away. From a camp by a desolate tarn near the foot of the West peak we spent a day of storm and sunshine climbing the rock ridge which leads to the col at the foot of the arete. We did not reach the col, but from high up the ridge we looked directly across a narrow ice-fall to the north side of the East peak. Since what I have so far written has shown our judgement to be unusually fallible it is perhaps gratuitous to record our opinion that given good conditions the East peak could be climbed from this side. And it is, I think, a less hazardous guess to say that it is not likely to be climbed from any other.

There were one or two very stiff engagements on the Chinese Food Front to be fought before we were able to disengage in tolerably good order, our heads aching but unbowed, to begin the 1,000- mile trek to Kashgar. The truck in which we travelled deserves an honourable mention, being the survivor of two 30-cwt. Fords which Sir Eric Teichman drove from Peking to Kashgar in 1935. The trip took six days, long hard days, devoid of incident except for a display of the Pathan driver's luck or markmanship in killing, with two shots, two gazelle who unwisely loitered within 200 yards of the road.

In the first week of September I made a quick excursion to reconnoitre the north side of Chakragil. This 22,000-foot mountain is part of what Burrard and Hayden call the Muztagh Ata range which includes the mountain of that name (24,380 feet) and Kungur (25,150 feet). In 1947 we had seen Chakragil from the west whence an ascent looked easy, but that side was awkward to get at from Kashgar and Shipton did not wish to be away for more than a week. (It is a pity that this otherwise ideal post should be in touch with the outer world by wireless.) The north-east ridge of the mountain had been seen on another occasion by Shipton, and by that too, if one could get on to it, the mountain seemed climbable.

I therefore went to see this ridge and having got to a height of 14,000 feet on its north side I was puzzled by what I saw, or rather failed to see. That very considerable protuberance, Chakragil, was nowhere in sight. The long snow slope on which I stood appeared to run up unbroken to the main ridge, and half-right was a fine rock and ice cirque carrying a mean, squat snow bump. This queer impression I got was, I think, the result of a fresh and heavy fall of snow, for when we camped at the same spot a week later when the snow had gone we saw that my snow slope was in fact broken by a considerable glacier and that the squat bump was the summit and a very worthy one.

We had with us Gyalgen, a brother of Lhakpa, without his great belly and without his intelligence and drive; also a long, cadaverous Kirghiz whose recent prowess on a hill when after Ovis Poli had impressed Shipton not a little. We decided to take up one tent only, and therefore only one victim was required. Unluckily the lot fell on the Kirghiz. Having reached and crossed the upper glacier and surmounted a broken ice wall beyond it we found ourselves on easy snow leading to the ridge. Here we took over Gyalgen's load, sent him home and pushed on. The Kirghiz had been flying distress signals for some time and we had to carry his load for the last few hundred feet to our camp in a snow hollow at 17,000 feet.

None of us, I think, had a good night. The wind blew disturbingly, I had a bad headache, and when my companion greeted the unwelcome dawn with a pithy aphorism about the respective worth of the game and the candle, I concluded that in the night watches he, too, 'had been acquainted with sad misery'. As for the cadaverous Kirghiz, he was in a bad way. Having eaten nothing he had spent the night semi-recumbent, groaning, moaning, spitting. By morning he was helpless, but since there was only one tent we could not leave him behind. The tent at the 14,000-foot camp had been taken down by Gyalgen, so that if we took the Kirghiz down, as we must, the tent had to go too. In short it was all up.

The sun shone, the snow was hard, so we climbed the remaining few hundred feet to the ridge for photography. The ridge stretched away alluringly to the distant summit: only one more camp would be needed, and there was no lack of camp sites. Personally, I should have liked another day to acclimatize, but another day would not have cured the troubles of the Kirghiz, except perhaps by killing him. He was spitting blood now and could barely stand, so that he accomplished most of the descent in a sitting position on the rope. At the 14,000-foot camp we put up the tent and left him there for a recovery squad to bring in while we, too readily I fear, responded to the call of the fleshpots at the yurts below. Next day much snow fell; perhaps we should not have got up after all.

The case of this Kirghiz was so strange that we had him medically examined. There seemed to be nothing abnormal about him, from which we learn that even a man who spends most of his life above 10,000 feet is not to be depended upon to go high.

I encountered a less serious instance of the same thing on the way back to India. Having reached Misgar on the Hunza side of the Sinkiang frontier I thought I had followed the beaten track far enough. The previous year the same thought had occurred to me and had led me into trouble, but this year I determined to keep on the right side of the Hindu Kush, that is the Indian side, and make direct for Chitral without touching Gilgit. Carrying sugar, tea, flour, and nothing else, not even a tent, I went up the Chapursan nallah where I picked up two Wakhis as coolies or guides. (This nallah belongs to Hunza but is settled by Wakhis.) Our first obstacle was the 17,000-foot Chillinji pass. My two Wakhis, whose village was over 10,000 feet up, suffered severely from headache and lagged far behind whereas this time I was quite free of it, and consequently had all the work to do. Although it was mid-October and very cold, and no snow had fallen for weeks, the snow near the top of the pass would not support one.

Beyond the Chillinji nothing went right. I had assumed that my two guides knew the way, but this was a mistake which, like most of the big mistakes of life, was discovered too late. Then the weather broke and two days later when we were near the Karumbar water- shed and at about 13,000 feet a pall of snow hid the track and a pall of cloud extinguished all landmarks. It had been a tenuous track at best, made apparently by only one man (mounted) and his dog, on their way possibly to mow some distant upland meadow. In a trackless waste of soft deep snow, where visibility was poor and a shrewd wind blew, my two Wakhis sat down and wept. ^£We shall all die' was the burthen of their song. Bowing to a malign fate, an act of homage to which I was now getting accustomed, I gave the word for retreat.

We plodded back down the rough Karumbar nallah to Imit where I was royally fed by the Rajah. Whatever we may have done or left undone in the past the fact remains that in those parts an Englishman is sure of a warm welcome. I had thoughts of rejoining my original route by doubling back over the Darkot pass, but on the Ishkuman pass (14,000 feet) there w is much fresh snow, so I went down to Gupis and to the beaten track which I could no longer shun.

I reached Chitral on 4th November, thirty-five days out from Kashgar.

⇑ Top