The Explorers Journal - Fall 2020

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THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL new perspectives

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contents FALL 2020

features INTO UNCHARTED TERRITORY

TO THE LIGHTHOUSE

a famed Texas “show cave” with far more to reveal text by C. WILLIAM “BILL” STEELE

a 2,500-kilometer journey of discovery in lockdown

images by BENNET T LEE

text and images by NICK SMITH

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THE RESILIENCE OF FISH OWLS

STORIES CARVED IN STONE

in the forests of eastern Siberia, the largest owl on Earth persists

documenting the petroglyphs of Arabia’s great sand seas

by JONATHAN C. SLAGHT

text and images by CHRISTOPH BAUMER

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52

regulars PRESIDENT’S LE T TER

EDITOR’S NOTE

E XPLOR ATION NE WS

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HARVESTING THE W ILD

E X TREME MEDICINE

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RE VIE WS

W HAT W ERE THE Y THINKING?

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DILLON ELLIS DESCENDS INTO THE “INFERNO ROOM” DURING AN EXPEDITION THAT REVEALED A HOST OF NEW PASSAGEWAYS IN THE FAMED NATURAL BRIDGE CAVERNS SHOW CAVE IN TEXAS. PHOTOGRAPH BY BENNETT LEE.

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president’s letter

expanding horizons RICHARD WIESE President

It has been said that “necessity is the mother of innovation,” and while I would not want us to endure another pandemic, this has been a particularly productive time for The Explorers Club. Over the past few months, we have embarked on a trio of programs that are allowing us to grow and see things in a new light: the awarding of the first class of Discovery Expedition Grants; the launching of “The Explorers 50” program; and the forming of a Diversity and Inclusion initiative, the latter spearheaded

by Board Member J.R. Harris.

In September, we announced the first waves of Discovery Expedition Grants— totaling $250,000 of $1,000,000 dispersed annually—to six exceptional explorers, researchers, and scientists. It is notable in that this is the largest amount of grant funding we have provided in our 116-year history.

Even outside of a pandemic year, it is a level of funding that is a real game changer, as it makes our organization a serious player in the world of field science and expeditions.

The aim of “The Explorers 50” initiative is to honor unsung explorers who are changing the world. As of this writing, we have received nearly 400 nominations, and the caliber is superb. We will be announcing the honorees in the new year.

Recent studies have demonstrated that groups with greater diversity function more effectively because of the different experiences and perspectives that diversity provides. In that light, we are not seeking to change the nature of the Club or its membership criteria through our Diversity and Inclusion initiative, but rather to draw on the intellectual horsepower of diverse population segments.

We have all faced hardships over the past few months, but explorers do not shy away from hard things. Instead, we use them as tools of innovation and come through them with fresh perspectives. In the words of our Honorary President, Bertrand Piccard, the Club “will come out of this crisis in better shape than before.” Thank you for your understanding and support.

EXPLORERS CLUB PRESIDENT RICHARD WIESE AT MT. RUSHMORE.

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editor’s note

new perspectives ANGELA M.H. SCHUSTER Editor-in-Chief

As the global pandemic has continued to extend its temporary hold on our expeditionary plans, many of us have sought out novel new “workarounds” to sate our Fernweh and intellectual curiosity.

For this edition of THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL, veteran caver Bill Steele, who was slated to spend this spring and summer probing the subterranean labyrinth of Sistema Huautla in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, was forced to scrap his field season due to ongoing travel restrictions. Not one to sit still, he decided to shine his headlamp on speleological marvels closer to his Texas home—a show cave known as Natural Bridge Caverns, which attracts nearly a half-million visitors a year. For all its fame, however, much of the cave’s splendor has remained hidden; that was until last year, when Steele and his team ventured into a suite of previously unknown passages for the first time. Since then, Steele

and fellow cavers have continued to push deeper into the system, adding 600 meters to its known length.

Meanwhile, Jonathan Slaght of the Wildlife Conservation Society shares his valiant efforts to preserve the habitat of the Blakiston’s fish owl, a denizen of far eastern Siberia and the largest owl in the world. We also catch up with Swiss researcher Christoph Baumer, who, against the odds, was able to complete his spring survey of petroglyphs on the Arabian Peninsula, shedding light on climate change and cultural adaptation over the past 10,000 years.

And we would be remiss if we did not to give a shout out to THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL’s UK bureau chief Nick Smith, who beat back his own virus anxiety by turning government-imposed restrictions on travel into a different type of adventure, documenting in detail the natural wonders within an 8-kilometer radius of his Swansea home.

A SELFIE TAKEN AT THE SIXTEENTH-CENTURY TOWER OF BELÉM DURING THE GLOBAL EXPLORATION SUMMIT IN LISBON LAST JULY.

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NORTH POLE 1909 • SOUTH POLE 1911 • EVEREST 1953 • MARIANA TRENCH 1960 • MOON 1969 PHOTOGRAPH BY ULLA LOHMANN, ULLALOHMANN.COM

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THE EXPLORERS CLUB PRESIDENT

Richard Wiese

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

OFFICERS

PATRONS & SPONSORS

HONOR ARY CHAIRMAN

Kathryn D. Sullivan, PhD HONOR ARY PRESIDENT

Bertrand Piccard, PhD HONOR ARY DIRECTORS

HRH Albert II, Prince of Monaco Robert Ballard, PhD Sylvia A. Earle, PhD Gilbert M. Grosvenor Donald C. Johanson, PhD Richard E. Leakey, DSc Frederik D.A. Paulsen, PhD Roland R. Puton Johan Reinhard, PhD Edward P. Roski, Jr. George B. Schaller, PhD Kathryn D. Sullivan, PhD Don Walsh, PhD HRH Jigyel Ugyen Wangchuck

CL ASS OF 2021

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V P, F L A G & H O N O R S

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CL ASS OF 2023

Mark J. Fowler

Constance Difede Barbara Doran Kellie Gerardi David Isserman Brianna Rowe

TREASURER

Barbara Doran S E C R E TA R Y

Arnella Trent

APPOINTED DIRECTORS

OMBUDSMAN

Aida “Idee” Belau Daniel A. Kobal, PhD Mead Treadwell Steve Pigott

the explorers journal

Brian P. Hanson

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THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL© (ISSN 0014-5025) is published quarterly by The Explorers Club, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY, and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021.

PRESIDENT & PUBLISHER

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS

SUBSCRIPTIONS

Richard Wiese

Jeff Blumenfeld James M. Clash Wade Davis, PhD David A. Dolan Michael J. Manyak, MD Milbry C. Polk David Rothenberg Carl G. Schuster Nick Smith Les Stroud

Print edition: One year, $48; two years, $90; three years, $132; single numbers, $14.00; foreign orders, add $12.00 per year.

Digital edition: One year, $29.95; single number, $8.95. Subscribe at: www.theexplorersjournal.org. Members of The Explorers Club receive THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL as a perquisite of membership.

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Angela M.H. Schuster C R E AT I V E D I R E C T O R

Jesse Alexander COPY EDITOR

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P U B L I C AT I O N S C H A I R

Leon “Lee” V. Langan

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SUBMISSIONS

Manuscripts and books for review, as well as newsstand sales and advertising inquiries, should be sent to the Editor, THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021, telephone: 212-628-8383, fax: 212-288-4449, email: editor@explorers.org. All manuscripts are subject to review.

THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL is not responsible for unsolicited materials.

The views and opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of The Explorers Club or THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL. The Explorers Club, THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL, The Explorers Club Travel Program, World Center For Exploration, and The Explorers Club Flag and Seal are registered trademarks of The Explorers Club, Inc., in the United States and elsewhere. All rights reserved. © The Explorers Club, 2020.

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membership in

THE EXPLORERS CLUB

FOUNDED IN 1904 BY A GROUP OF AMERICA’S LEADING EXPLORERS, THE EXPLORERS CLUB IS A MULTIDISCIPLINARY PROFESSIONAL SOCIET Y DEDICATED TO THE ADVANCEMENT OF FIELD RESEARCH, SCIENTIFIC EXPLOR ATION, AND THE IDEAL THAT IT IS VITAL TO PRESERVE THE INSTINCT TO EXPLORE. THE CLUB’S STEADFAST MISSION HAS BEEN TO ENCOUR AGE AND

PROMOTE SCIENTIFIC EXPLOR ATION OF L AND, SEA, AIR, AND SPACE, WITH AN EMPHASIS ON THE PHYSICAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES. AS A PRIMARY AND PRESTIGIOUS CENTER FOR EXPLOR ATION AND EXPEDITION PL ANNING, THE CLUB IS A FOCAL POINT AND UNIF YING FORCE FOR EXPLORERS AND SCIENTISTS WORLDWIDE, WITH 33 CHAPTERS SPANNING THE GLOBE.

For information regarding categories of membership— Fellow, Member, Friend, Term, and Student—and the process of election to The Explorers Club, visit us at www.explorers.org. The downloadable application sets

forth qualifications for all levels of membership. Additionally, inquiries pertaining to sponsorship and local chapters may be made directly through the Club’s Membership Office, 212-628-8383, ext. 23.

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THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

EXPLORATION NEWS EDITED BY JEFF BLUMENFELD

NEW LIGHT ON EVEREST SEEING SAGARMATHA THROUGH SHERPA E YES “What would it be like to work the hardest job on the planet?” Just ask Nate Menninger, 26, an adventurer from Boston, who decided to take a job as one of the first non-native Everest porters. That meant being paid $15 a day for hauling enormous packs weighing up to 100 kilograms along rugged, high-altitude trails, huddling with fellow porters in freezing huts at night, and sharing their basic rations.

Fascinated by Everest, but unable to afford the

tens of thousands of dollars needed to cover the cost of the permit and logistical support, Menninger hit upon the idea of climbing the mountain for free. “I realized if I climbed Everest as a porter, I wouldn’t have to pay $65,000. I would actually get paid to climb Everest.”

While Menninger had his sights set on a summit bid, he eventually scaled back his original plan to top out on Everest, deciding instead to work alongside the Sherpas carrying loads on the arduous

11-day hike from the town of Lukla, at 2,865 meters above sea level, to Everest Base Camp. Subsisting mainly on a diet of rice with lentils, he lost more than 20 pounds during the trek. Along the way, Menninger made a film about his experiences, which he hopes will shine a light on the largely unsung work of Everest porters and the precarious way they eke out a living in one of the planet’s toughest environments. The Porter: The Untold Story at Everest is available on Vimeo.

NATE MENNINGER EN ROUTE TO EVEREST BASE CAMP. PHOTOGRAPH BY BABIN DULAL.

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JOIN THE “EXPLORERS IMMORTALS” AND ENGRAVE YOUR NAME OR DEDICATION IN STONE ON NEW PAVERS FOR THE LEFRAK TERRACE AT EXPLORERS CLUB HEADQUARTERS. ADORN OUR LANDMARK OUTDOOR SPACE AND HELP PAY FOR URGENT WORK FOR PHASE II RENOVATIONS BY MAKING A TA X-DEDUCTIBLE DONATION OF $2,500 PER DEDICATED PAVER TO OUR LOWELL THOMAS BUILDING FUND. THE EXPLORERS CLUB WOULD LIKE TO THANK THE FOLLOWING WHO HAVE PURCHASED A PAVER:

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NOTE: SPOTS FOR ENGRAVING AND DEDICATIONS WILL BE SUBJECT TO CONTRACTOR AND LANDMARK PRESERVATION COMMISSION REQUIREMENTS. ENGRAVINGS ARE LIMITED TO 20 CHARACTERS. WE WILL ACCEPT DONATIONS AND ASSIGN TILES IN THE ORDER RECEIVED. PLEASE CONTACT WILL ROSEMAN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: WROSEMAN@EXPLORERS.ORG.

E XPL OR AT ION NE WS

NEW MOON RULES Eight countries have signed on as founding member nations to NASA’s Artemis Accords during the 71st International Astronautical Congress in early October.

Those nations include Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Released

by NASA this past May, the Artemis Accords were drafted to establish a framework of principles for safely and responsibly planning for humanity’s return to the Moon.

FINDING VENUSIAN METEORITES ON THE MOON A growing body of research has suggested the planet Venus may have once had an Earth-like environment, with water and a thin atmosphere. Yet testing such theories has been difficult, with an absence of geological samples to examine.

That may be changing, if Yale University astronomers

Samuel Cabot and Gregory Laughlin have a say. The duo posits that pieces of the second planet from the Sun—perhaps billions of them—just might be found on Earth’s Moon in a new study explaining their theory, which has been accepted by the refereed Planetary Science Journal.

The researchers contend that asteroids and comets slamming into Venus may have dislodged as many as 10 billion rocks and sent them into an orbit that intersected with Earth and Earth’s Moon. “Some of these rocks will eventually land on the Moon as Venusian meteorites,” says Cabot, the lead author of the study. While catastrophic impacts such as these only happen every hundred million years or so, he explains, they occurred more frequently billions of years ago.

“The Moon offers safekeeping for these ancient rocks,” Cabot adds.

“Anything from Venus that landed on Earth is probably buried very deep, due to geological activity. These rocks would be much better preserved on the Moon.”

Upcoming missions to the Moon could give Cabot and Laughlin their answer soon.

The researchers said NASA’s Artemis program is the perfect opportunity to collect and analyze unprecedented amounts of lunar soil.

A MAJOR LOSS FOR CLIMATE SCIENCE Konrad Steffen, the Swiss polar scientist whose pioneering work showed that climate change is melting Greenland’s vast ice sheet at an alarming rate, died after falling into a crevasse near his Arctic research station on August 8. He was 68. According to fellow researcher Jason Box who was at the station, known as “Swiss Camp,” which Steffen established in 1990, the crevasse was a known hazard, but high winds and recent snowfall had resulted in poor visibility, making the crack in the ice hard to spot.

“Brought together by our mutual passion for cryosphere exploration, I had the privilege of learning from ‘Koni’ in recent years as we worked to set up the Swiss Polar Institute,” says Frederik Paulsen, an Honorary Director of The Explorers Club, which bestowed its Lowell Thomas Award on Steffen in 2017.

FULL MOON PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN BY GREGORY H. REVERA WITH A CELESTRON 9.25 SCHMIDT-CASSEGRAIN TELESCOPE. PORTRAIT OF PIONEERING POLAR RESEARCHER KONRAD STEFFEN BY JASON VAN BRUGGEN.

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THE EXPLORERS CLUB outfitters SHOP THE COLLECTION TODAY! V ISIT STORE.E X PLORERS.ORG

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INTO

UNCHARTED TERRITORY a famed Texas “show cave” with far more to reveal

text by C. WILLIAM “BILL” STEELE images by BENNET T LEE

THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

NATURAL BRIDGE CAVERNS SAN ANTONIO, TEX AS

A FELLOW OF THE EXPLORERS CLUB SINCE 1979, C. WILLIAM “BILL” STEELE HAS VENTURED INTO SOME OF THE DEEPEST CAVES IN THE WORLD, INCLUDING SISTEMA HUAUTLA IN THE MEXICAN STATE OF OA X ACA, WHERE HE HAS LED MORE THAN A DOZEN EXPLORERS CLUB FLAG EXPEDITIONS OVER THE PAST FOUR DECADES. SINCE 1970, STEELE HAS BEEN INVOLVED IN THE EXPLORATION AND MAPPING OF MAMMOTH CAVE IN KENTUCK Y, THE WORLD’S LONGEST CAVE. A LEADING CAVE PHOTOGRAPHER, BENNETT LEE STARTED CAVING AS A TEEN WITH BILL STEELE SOME THREE DECADES AGO. FOR MORE OF HIS WORK, VISIT: BENNETTLEE.COM.

Had the spring field season gone according to plan, I would have been heading back down to southern Mexico with my fellow cavers to continue our push ever deeper into Sistema Huautla, which, at 1,560 meters, is the deepest cave system in the Western Hemisphere.

Since 1980, I have led more than a dozen Explorers Club flag expeditions into Huautla.

This year, I was to have been joined by a team of 27 of the world’s top speleologists and scientists from five countries. With the coming of the Covid-19 pandemic, however, we were forced to scrap our April-May expedition two weeks prior to departure.

With my international travel feathers temporarily clipped, and not one to sit idly by, I decided to turn my proverbial headlamp back onto speleological treasures closer to home—in this case, a world-class “show cave” known as Natural Bridge Caverns (NBC) on the outskirts of San Antonio, where last summer we discovered some

500 meters of previously unknown passageways. These are the first to be found since the Texas Hill Country cave was designated a National Natural Landmark in 1971, and, it is funny to think, they might never have been found had it not been for chance discussion with fellow caver and a friend of many years, Orion Knox, during an outing of the Texas Chapter of The Explorers Club in October 2018.

I had been invited to present the latest findings from Sistema Huautla at a lecture-dinner, which was to be held in Longhorn Cavern State Park, an hour and a half northwest of Austin. In addition to touring the Longhorn caves before dinner,

OPENING SPREAD: CAVE-CLIMBING LEGEND LEE WHITE MAKES HIS WAY UP THE 30-METER-HIGH WALL OF THE DOME PIT, WHICH WAS CONSIDERED “UNCLIMBABLE” FOR MORE THAN HALF A CENTURY.

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OVERVIEW OF THE NORTH CAVERN

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LIMBO PASSAGE 207

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0 0 50 25 100 50 150 200 CASTL 75 250 METERS FEET *depth below top of Natural Bridge #5 WELL SHAFT (entrance)

JAREMY ROOM (entrance)

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TRAVERTINE PASSAGE

NEW DOME ROOM FROZEN FALLS CHAMBER FLOWSTONE HALL

EXPLORATION HISTORY PREHISTORIC: Earliest human activity has been dated to 5000 BCE. EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURY: First rooms explored by local ranchers.

JANUARY 20, 1960: “Raccoon Rooms” off the cave entrance just to the west of the Natural Bridge discovered by Orion Knox.

MARCH 27, 1960: North Cavern show cave chambers discovered by Orion Knox, Preston Knodell, Al Brandt, and Joe Cantu.

DECEMBER 6, 1967: Shaft into the so-called Jaremy Room at the east end of the South Cavern (not shown on map) completed and explored

by Jack Burch, Reggie Wuest, and Myles Kuykendall.

JANUARY 8-9, 1968: Shaft into South Cavern completed and explored

by Jack Burch, Reggie Wuest, and Myles Kuykendall.

MAY 8, 2019: Passage at the top of the Dome Pit discovered and explored by Brad and Travis Wuest, Lee White, Bill Steele, Justin Royce, and Bennett Lee. JULY 27, 2019: Newfound passageways off the Dome Pit mapped using both traditional methods and LIDAR. JUNE 2019–PRESENT: Cavers continue to push deeper into the system, with more than 600 meters of newly discovered passageways added.

RIVER STYX

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“Without saying a word, we knew it probably could be climbed by someone with the right skill set.”

I suggested to the event organizers that our members might enjoy a full day of caving if we included an optional midday trip to NBC, a 90-minute drive away. If so, I would be delighted to see if we might be led through the caverns by none other than Orion Knox, who, along with three fellow St. Mary’s University students—Preston Knodell, Al Brandt, and Joe Cantu—discovered NBC in March of 1960. (In a “normal” year, the caves, which were opened to the public in the summer of 1964, attract nearly a half-million visitors.) Orion graciously agreed and a tour was arranged.

Upon our return to the visitor center after the excellent tour, my partner Diana Tomchick spied a map of the cave on the wall and gleefully asked Orion if there were any remaining passages to be explored.

With a slight smile, he pointed to a place on the map marked the “Dome Pit,” which, at 30 meters in height, was one of the tallest chambers in the cave. Orion suspected that there may be a passage near its ceiling but, when it was surveyed back in the 1960s,

the cavers’ carbide lamps were not bright enough to see if there was a passage leading off from the top of the dome. He also explained that the limestone walls of the chamber were soft in places, making it difficult, if not impossible, to climb. My curiosity piqued, I smiled at Diana. Without saying a word, we knew it probably could be climbed by someone with the right skill set.

In the months following our visit, Orion put me in touch with Brad and Travis Wuest, third-generation owners of the caverns, which are located on private property, and we were able to arrange a trip to check out the Dome Pit firsthand.

In February 2019, Diana and I returned to NBC, armed with our powerful Scurion headlamps, which were sure to provide far better illumination than had been used in the cave before.

We met up with the Wuest brothers and two of their NBC guides and surveyors, Justin Royce and Dillon Ellis, and set off for the Dome Pit. Passing beyond the exit tunnel that marked the end of the paved tourist trail within the cave, we went over a handrail, down a flight of concrete steps, and into a suite of undeveloped passageways and chambers, including a massive one known as the Inferno Room, which is filled with blocks of rock and dangling speleothems. Within minutes we found ourselves squeezing, climbing slippery muddy slopes, stoop-walking, belly crawling, and working

PREVIOUS PAGE: OUR EXPEDITION WAS THE FIRST TO LAY EYES ON THIS PRISTINE POOL WITHIN A PASSAGE AT THE TOP OF DOME PIT. FACING PAGE: BRAD WUEST LOOKS UP A FLOWSTONE CLIMB AT THE BACK OF THE NEWLY DISCOVERED “TRAVERTINE PASSAGE.” ITS RIMSTONE DAMS, WHICH HOLD POOLS OF CRYSTAL-CLEAR WATER, ARE ONLY A FEW CENTIMETERS THICK AND MORE THAN A METER HIGH.

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“In an hour and a half, he was at the top, and shouted to the us down below, ‘It goes!’ ”

our way through constrictions, which necessitated contortionist moves. An hour and a half later, we reached the Dome Pit—a sheer drop into an enormous chamber. A rolled-up cable ladder was rigged, and each of us was belayed down to its base.

The light-colored limestone walls of the Dome Pit towered more than 30 meters to a flat ceiling. Our bright Scurion headlamps lit up the chamber and it appeared that indeed there was a large passage at the top, which could be reached by a skilled cave wall climber. I had just the right guy in mind—Lee White, who had been a key member of our Sistema Huautla team since 2017.

Eager to explore uncharted chambers in the cave on their own property, the Wuest brothers expressed interest in our relatively high-tech gear and asked lots of questions as they would need to be better equipped and better trained if they were to be part of our exploratory team pushing deeper into the cave system. I told them not only about our Scurion headlamps, but also about Gonzo Guano Gear and our frog vertical climbing system; CaveSkinz pants and jackets; and, lastly, shared a favorite gear source, On Rope 1, for the right kind of pack, etc. They kept notes.

Based on this new information, we made a plan to return to the Dome Pit with Lee White in early May, once we had concluded our spring Huautla expedition. While we were in Mexico, I got an email from the

Wuest brothers who said they had returned to the Dome Pit with a drone operator who flew his drone up to the ceiling and into the passage at the top. They said there were large stalagmites and it looked good.

As planned, Lee and I made our way to NBC and into the Dome Pit in early May. We soon realized that climbing it was a bigger deal than we envisioned. We were also aware that the unexplored passageway had the potential to lead to exciting new cave chambers.

After an early morning planning session on May 8, our group of 20, including a video team and a drone team, entered the cave. Upon arriving at the Dome Pit, Lee immediately scanned the walls with his bright headlamp and eyeballed his route.

He chose to go directly up the left wall to the passage above. There was a ledge that could easily be reached about 5 meters up where he planned to place his first bolt.

With me belaying him, he would carry the end of a static caving rope with him that would be fed out as he climbed.

Two drones buzzed around Lee, shooting video and still photos as he steadily drilled and hammered bolts during his ascent. In an hour and a half, he was at the top, and shouted to the us down below, “It goes!”

FACING PAGE: AUTHOR BILL STEELE RAPPELS OUT OF BELAYMAN’S BLUFF AND INTO THE INFERNO ROOM.

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Lee pulled up the belay rope, rigged the static rope, and rappelled back down, removing the hangers as he did. Then six of us (the Wuest brothers, Lee White, Bennett Lee, Justin Royce, and I) climbed the rope one at a time and went off into virgin cave passage.

The passage was a canyon consistently 5 to 6 meters tall and 2 to 3 meters wide. The ancient mud on the floor stuck to our boots and caused them to become heavy. Nearly 200 meters in, we came to a pit in the floor and the passage continued beyond it. By the time we wrapped up this first foray and exited the cave it was 1:30 in the morning.

While we were in the passages, the Wuest brothers collected samples of bat guano to date the bat activity in these passages. One guano sample dated to 7,500 years and a second to 6,400 years ago.

These dates match archeological dates of a known collapse at the entrance, at which time access by bats was likely blocked. A third guano sample taken in the main show cave reveals bat activity as far back as 15,000 years ago. Formation of the cave system began some 10 million years ago.

The following month, while I was continuing to survey and map new passages in Mammoth Cave, the longest known cave in the world, the Wuest brothers went back to the Dome Pit passage and continued to push deeper into the upper level canyon, which went about 100 meters farther, before terminating in a “T” intersection that ended both to the left and the right. To the left it dropped down into a room, but there was no way to continue out of it.

Brad also descended the pit in the floor of the passage, which turned out to be around 30 meters in depth. It dropped into a nicesized passage with rimstone dams, pools of crystal-clear water, and large stalagmites.

Given the pristine and non-muddy nature of the pit, future exploration will require a clean change of clothes and shoes, with muddy clothes, boots, and climbing rig to be left

at the base of the rope. It was clear that the passage opened up with impressive formations much like the ones for which the show part of the cave is known.

On July 27, Diana and I returned to NBC along with two cave mappers—Andrea Croskrey and David Ochel from Austin. We teamed up with the Wuest brothers and other fellow cavers, including NBC staff geologist Brian Vauter, to carry out a proper survey of the newfound passageways. In addition to mapping and photographing what had already been explored, we would lay the groundwork for a 3D-LIDAR scanning team, which would be coming in later.

Having entered the cave at 10:30 a.m., we emerged starving and exhausted some 18 hours later. Fortunately, food and beverages awaited us back at the garage by the visitor center, where we washed off our gear and told tales until daybreak.

Since that mapping mission, we have returned to the cave several times with plans to continue our push into the system later this fall with more than 600 meters of new cave passages having been explored and mapped since our initial entry in 2019. And our excitement continues to build about NBC’s potential, tempered only by the sudden loss of Lee White. In September 2019, the best cave wall climber in the world was tragically killed in a car crash at age 31. We plan to carry on his unbridled spirit as we continue to explore one of Earth’s great geological wonders.

PREVIOUS PAGE: TRAVIS WUEST (LEFT) AND BRAD WUEST (RIGHT) IN THE NEWLY DISCOVERED FROZEN FALLS CHAMBER. FACING PAGE, TOP: ORION KNOX, NOW 79, CRAWLS THROUGH A SQUEEZE KNOWN AS THE BIRTH CANAL MORE THAN A HALF CENTURY SINCE HE AND HIS COLLEGE BUDDIES DISCOVERED THE NATURAL BRIDGE CAVERNS. BOTTOM: THE SURVEY TEAM FOLLOWING SOME 20 HOURS OF STRAIGHT CAVING AND MAPPING, FROM LEFT: BENNETT LEE, BILL STEELE, BRAD WUEST, DIANA TOMCHICK (FRONT), TRAVIS WUEST, DAVID OCHEL, ANDREA CROSKREY, DILLON ELLIS, AND JUSTIN ROYCE.

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THE

RESILIENCE FISH OWLS OF

in the forests of eastern Siberia, the largest owl on Earth persists

by JONATHAN C. SL AGHT

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PRIMORYE, RUSSIA

JONATHAN C. SL AGHT IS THE RUSSIA AND NORTHE AST ASIA COORDINATOR FOR THE W ILDLIFE CONSERVATION SOCIE T Y, W HERE HE MANAGES RESE ARCH PROJECTS ON ENDANGERED SPECIES AND COORDINATES AVIAN CONSERVATION ACTIVITIES ALONG THE E AST ASIAN–AUSTR AL ASIAN FLY WAY FROM THE ARCTIC TO THE TROPICS. HIS ANNOTATED TR ANSL ATION OF ACROSS THE USSURI KR AY , BY VL ADIMIR ARSENYE V, WAS PUBLISHED IN 2016, AND HIS WORK HAS BEEN FE ATURED BY THE NE W YORK TIMES , THE GUARDIAN , SMITHSONIAN MAG A ZINE , SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN , AND AUDUBON MAG A ZINE . HE LIVES IN MINNE APOLIS. THE FOLLOW ING NARR ATIVE IS BASED ON HIS NE W BOOK , OWLS OF THE E ASTERN ICE , PUBLISHED BY FARR AR, STR AUS, AND GIROUX .

When a Blakiston’s fish owl flies past, gliding on its two-meter wingspan, it’s immediately clear that you are in the presence of something special. These are remarkable birds, the largest owls in the world, creatures that prowl the rivers of Northeast Asia for salmon. Despite their size—they’re as tall as fire hydrants—they can be hard to see. Their flecked plumage blends among the browns and grays of the enormous elm and poplar trunks where they hide their nests, and they are shy, often slipping away quietly if they sense a human’s approach. When they hunt, anchored in still wait along rocky riverbanks, their stout forms can easily be dismissed as boulders or tree stumps.

In Primorye, Russia, one of the owls’ strongholds, narrow river valleys wind among the forested Sikhote-Alin Mountains.

This is a vast, quiet wilderness, one that the owls share with Amur tigers, brown bears, and raccoon dogs. In summer, the forest is claustrophobic with insect swarms and dense vegetation. Winters are extreme, with waist-deep snows and temperatures in the minus thirties. While other birds in Primorye fly south to escape the cold, fish owls stay.

OPENING SPREAD: A BLAKISTON’S FISH OWL, THE TUNSHA MALE. FACING PAGE: THE SHA-MI FEMALE, ALERT AND WITH EAR TUFTS ERECT, IS ABOUT TO FLUSH UPON THE AUTHOR’S APPROACH IN. BOTH PHOTOGRAPHS BY JONATHAN C. SLAGHT.

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Given the rarity of fish owls, the difficulties in reaching them, and their habitat, very little was known about these endangered birds. That was until recently.

Before I began my research, the only population estimate in Russia was decades old, from 1984, suggesting a mere 300 to 400 pairs in the entire country. And by the 1980s there were no more than 35 pairs left on the Japanese island of Hokkaido a few hundred kilometers to the east, a 90-percent population decline following a half-century of habitat loss to logging and river damming.

Given the acceleration of unsustainable logging and fishing in the Russian province of Primorye after the fall of the Soviet Union, biologists feared that the Russian population might follow their Japanese brethren on a path toward extinction.

In 2005, worried about the future of these birds, I began a PhD program to learn how to protect the owls, collaborating with two Russian ornithologists who happen to have the same first name—Sergey Surmach and Sergey Avdeyuk.

Every winter for five years we searched for, found, and studied fish owls. Some of the places we went to find these owls were only reachable by helicopter. Mostly, though, we drove a Soviet-designed transport vehicle as far into the wilderness as a logging road could take us, then skied or snowmobiled over frozen rivers from there.

As we camped out in the forest for weeks on end, enduring blizzards, windstorms, and deep freezes, I quickly came to respect the unapologetic hardiness of fish owls.

By 2010, we’d compiled enough information to develop a conservation plan to protect the species. These birds are very closely tied to river valleys, a rare landscape feature in otherwise mountainous Primorye, and for fish owls to thrive there must be a Goldilocks combination of sufficiently-large trees to nest in and fish-rich rivers that do not fully freeze in winter for them to hunt for food. But valleys are also where most road development, logging, and fishing are concentrated, resulting in fish owl deaths from vehicle collisions, drowning in fishing nets, and loss of nest trees to timber harvest. To minimize fish owl deaths and boost reproduction, the Sergeys and I have focused on reducing illegal human activity in the forests, namely poaching of salmon and trees, and erecting nest boxes for the owls to breed where natural tree cavities are absent. And to give reserve management an understanding of where fish owls exist on their lands, so they know to protect them, we’ve also surveyed for these cryptic owls in protected areas. In 2015 this effort led us to spend a winter searching the river valleys of the Sikhote-Alin Biosphere Reserve, a 4,000-square-kilometer block of wilderness established in 1935 and famous for its Amur tigers, where we found three pairs of fish owls.

Our work is slow going—there are only three of us—but we’ve been making a difference. Since 2012 unused logging roads through fish owl habitat have been decommissioned, and forests once quiet now pulse with the hungry shrieks of fish owl nestlings hidden in the 55-gallon drums we converted to nest boxes.

For all of our progress, however, we experienced a significant setback in late summer of 2016, when typhoon Lionrock settled over northeast Asia, bringing winds and rains that left hundreds of people dead in North Korea and Japan. Gale-force winds pummeled Primorye, with the strongest gusts howling directly over the central Sikhote-Alin Mountains, in the heart of fish-owl habitat.

PREVIOUS SPREAD: THIS STRETCH OF THE SHA-MI RIVER IS THE FAVORED HUNTING SPOT OF A RESIDENT PAIR OF BLAKISTON’S FISH OWLS. FACING PAGE: SHURIK POPOV CLIMBS ABOVE THE TANGLES OF THE KUDYA RIVER VALLEY TO SEE IF ONE OF THE OLD-GROWTH TREES NEARBY (OUT OF VIEW HERE) HOLDS A FISH OWL NEST. BOTH PHOTOGRAPHS

BY JONATHAN C. SLAGHT.

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By all accounts, it was the worst storm in Primorye in decades. Trees snapped at their bases or were uprooted entirely, then thrown onto one another in cluttered piles.

Whole river valleys of oak, birch, and pine became fields of debris overnight, with surviving trunks solitary and conspicuous like gravestones in a neglected cemetery. In the Sikhote-Alin Biosphere Reserve, an estimated 1,600 square kilometers of forest was lost, or 40 percent of the reserve’s total territory.

In the wake of the storm, I went to investigate the impact of Lionrock on the fish owls we’d studied since 2006. There, I found a jumble of logs and broken branches in the poplar grove where one nest tree used to be. At another site, the nest was splintered on the ground, nearly buried under the wreckage left there by receding floods. Our greatest shock came along the Dzhigitovka River, at an owl territory we’d only found in 2015 during our surveys of the Sikhote-Alin Biosphere Reserve, where the entire forest that had contained the nest tree was simply gone. During the storm, the river had broken its banks and sawed through the forest and a highway in a frenzied push toward the Sea of Japan. When the water retreated to its normal course, it left behind a scar through the valley, a wide bar of gray gravel and stone where poplar and pine once stood.

The birds at the Faata site have been silent since Lionrock, but during a few short visits I made into two nearby territories, at the Serebryanka and Tunsha Rivers, I’ve heard fish owls calling. To search for their nests, however, would require more time in the Russian woods than I had to spare, given that my wife and I now have two young children at home in Minneapolis. In March 2018, I was able to set aside a week for fieldwork during which I planned to focus my efforts on finding the nest in the Tunsha territory. For this foray, my companion was Sergey Surmach’s daughter Rada, whom I’d known since she was a child. Rada had

just entered a graduate program to study fish owls and build on her father’s legacy.

The going was difficult. The forest was like the ruins of some intricate labyrinth, with all passageways choked with rubble. Almost every step was a challenge, precipitating a pause to decide where to go next: through, over, under, or around the obstacle. We balanced on fallen trunks to move a dozen paces at a time unimpeded over the carnage, but such opportunities were rare. Our GPS tracks from that week show drunken meanders through the Tunsha River valley as we searched the floodplain for our prize.

Along the way, I explained the characteristics of a good nest tree to Rada, although with the destruction of the forest, there were few suitable examples. We paused at river crossings—the Tunsha broke into many channels here—and I showed her one place where the river was too narrow and too crowded by vegetation for a fish owl to hunt and another spot where the shallow riffle and expansive gravel bar were perfect.

On the third day of searching, my forehead a mixture of sweat and dirt and my clothes stained by pine pitch, I spied an enormous poplar and knew instantly we’d found the nest. More than a decade of experience told me that everything about the tree was right: it was a thick, gray column rising above the surrounding canopy, maybe a dozen meters tall, capped by a yawning cavity and only a stone’s throw from the river. Seconds after spotting the tree, I whispered to my companion to watch for a sentry, a male fish owl somewhere nearby guarding his mate on the nest, and almost immediately thereafter a fish owl flushed

PREVIOUS PAGE: THE GAZ-66 TRUCK, WHERE WE OFTEN LIVED DURING FISH OWL FIELDWORK, ON A COLD MORNING IN 2008.

PHOTOGRAPH BY JONATHAN C. SLAGHT. FACING PAGE: SHURIK POPOV SCANS THE TREES FOR A FISH OWL NEST ALONG THE SAMARGA RIVER IN 2006. PHOTOGRAPH BY ANATOLIY RYZHOV.

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from a nearby pine. It was the male, moving off with slow, steady wingbeats. As he flew, a handful of crows peeled from nearby trees chasing him in a serenade of excited caws.

Worried that the nest tree was unguarded, I hurried toward it to collect a quick fix with my GPS when the commotion must have panicked the female. Another owl appeared, this time emerging from the nest tree itself, an enormous ball of blurred brown wheeling above me in the sky. She landed on a branch, then hunched to get a better look at me; the crows pulsed around her like a swarm of summer insects. We locked eyes and she flew off, disappearing among the early-spring branches of the devastated Tunsha River valley.

As I’d learned during my fieldwork, the female would probably keep me in sight but not return until I was gone. So I moved away, both concerned for her eggs and elated at the same time: the Tunsha owls were okay.

They’d survived my PhD project and the recent typhoon and had found a suitable nest tree several kilometers from their old one.

They had adapted to the shifting dynamics of the river floodplain and didn’t need our conservation interventions—for the moment, anyway. This was a species that would not go down without a fight: they shrugged off catastrophic storms, withstood subzero temperatures, and ignored gangs of crows.

I was proud of their resilience.

The Sergeys and I will continue to keep tabs on them, monitor the evolving human threats, and offer our assistance when needed. Like the owls, we must stay vigilant.

PREVIOUS PAGE: A FISH OWL PAUSES IN SHALLOW RIVER WATER WITH ITS FRESH KILL, A YOUNG MASU SALMON, BEFORE SWALLOWING IT WHOLE IN 2017. PHOTOGRAPH BY SERGEY GAFITSKI. FACING PAGE: THE SAIYON NEST IN APRIL 2008, WITH A JUST-HATCHED, STILL-BLIND CHICK, WITH THE NARROW SAIYON RIVER VISIBLE BELOW. THE SECOND EGG NEVER HATCHED. PHOTOGRAPH BY JONATHAN C. SLAGHT.

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TO THE

LIGHTHOUSE a 2,500-kilometer journey of discovery in lockdown text and images by NICK SMITH

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long it would be before I could ever travel beyond the lighthouse that was, as luck would have it, 8 kilometers as the crow flies away to the west. As I stared out over the Bristol Channel, I could feel a low-level but persistent anxiety nagging away. If the media wanted to keep the Welsh public in a state of permanent fear and confusion, it was doing a good job. Every news broadcast became about the impending Gehenna barreling headlong towards us. I decided to explore the possibilities.

For most of us, the term “exploration” is a fluid one. As someone who has written on the topic for most of this century, I’m aware that despite reporting from more than 100 countries and both polar regions in my career to date, there are few widely-accepted definitions of the word that will allow me to use it in reference to myself. Having fallen under the spell of the great explorers of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration as a schoolboy in geography classes, I’ve had an adventuring spirit ever since. And if I couldn’t actually do what Shackleton and Scott had done, then I could at least stand where they stood, so that when I wrote of their deeds it wouldn’t just be from the viewpoint of the armchair. Over the years, I’ve crossed the deserts and mountain ranges, oceans and icecaps of the world, but never quite brought back sufficient knowledge to make these adventures qualify as flag-bearing expeditions.

At the beginning of the lockdown, I realized quickly that I’d been given the gift of time. And I was now presented with the choice of either wasting it watching Netflix or actually putting it to a purpose. One day, as I cycled to the beach with these thoughts

As the Covid-19 global health crisis forced everyone to rethink their lives this past spring, exploring in any traditional sense of the word seemed to be impossible for the foreseeable future. For those of us who could read the tea leaves, we had seen the lockdown coming for some time, but as we got closer to the inevitable, something curious seemed to happen, the sort of thing that wouldn’t have been out of place in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The physical world had started to shrink at an alarming pace.

In the week running up to the March 23 lockdown in the UK, my local Olympic-size pool closed. Being unable to train in the water, I thought I could at least keep fit on machines at the gym. By the time I got there, that too had closed. The sensation was a ground-rush as everything seemed to slip through my fingers like smoke. Anything familiar was receding into the distance. It was a strange feeling indeed for a journalist who has built a career being far from home.

Eight kilometers. If you lived in Wales, that was the distance you were allowed to travel from your house. No farther. One hour per day outdoor exercise was the next restriction put in place by the Welsh government. No more. As I looked out of the window of my study over the broad sweep of Swansea Bay, I began to wonder how

OPENING SPREAD: A TRACK TO THE MUMBLES LIGHTHOUSE LEADING SOUTH FROM MUMBLES HILL LOCAL NATURE RESERVE. FACING PAGE: THE DESERTED SANDS OF SWANSEA BAY WITH THE LIGHTHOUSE ON THE DISTANT HEADLAND.

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in my mind, I had a flat tire and caught the attention of a policeman who wanted to know where I was going. He thought I was being irresponsible cycling during a health crisis and gave me a stern lecture on my civic duty. And so, I asked him how far I could legitimately cycle while maintaining Covid-19 compliance. His response—the barely logical “to the lighthouse”—set something going in my mind. Maybe here was a challenge of sorts to keep me occupied.

I’ve lived in Swansea intermittently for half a century and I know every blade of grass and every Carboniferous limestone crag that punctuates the coastline’s golden sands.

There’s nothing anyone can tell me about this small seaside town—that is only known to the outside world because it is where Dylan Thomas came from–that would surprise me.

And yet, as my daily cycle ride to the lighthouse and back became a habit, I realized that my knowledge wasn’t as complete as I supposed. As I discovered more and more places I’d never seen, my photographer’s instincts kicked in and I decided to use this time to photograph my hometown—something I’d thought about doing for years.

But you know how it is: when you return to base camp after photographing penguins in Antarctica, or leopards on the Serengeti, or golden bats in islands of the Indian Ocean, the last thing you want to do is photograph a few herring gulls circling the local pier.

The next thing I knew, my desk was strewn with Ordnance Survey maps; tide tables; and guides to the birds, flora, and geology of the region. On my computer I’d loaded software for calculating sun positions, while on my phone I was busily consulting digital

A CELTIC MAZE IN THE DISUSED ROSEHILL QUARRY LESS THAN A KILOMETER FROM MY HOUSE. MADE FROM LOCAL COCKLESHELLS, IT WAS COMPLETELY UNKNOWN TO ME (AND MOST PEOPLE IN THE AREA) UNTIL I STARTED EXPLORING SWANSEA IN MICROCOSM.

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cartographic apps. In my pack were binoculars, compasses (both digital and analogue), penknives, a geology hammer, collecting bags, insect repellent, sunscreen, polarized eyewear, notebooks, and an arsenal of cameras and lenses. Without knowing it, I was doing something that I’d never really done before: planning an expedition. But in what sense could I really call it that? After all, the law said that I couldn’t travel more than 8 kilometers. That’s mere detail, I said to myself. Who says you can’t explore on your doorstep? But the cameras were a problem.

It’s not that you can’t cycle with 10 kilos of professional photographic gear on your back, because you can. It was more that, reading the runes, I could see that while I had developed a positive mental strategy to counter the fear that was infecting the world as much as any virus could, I would need to carry through my explorations as inconspicuously as possible. While I absolutely insist that I didn’t break any of the rules, guidelines, or recommendations (this became a badge of honor for my “micro-expedition” as I was now calling it), I also didn’t want to be seen to be making capital out of a national crisis, wielding a 400mm lens while everyone was frightened for their lives and their livelihoods.

By accident rather than design, the day before lockdown was announced my daughter and I had treated ourselves to brand new top-of-the-range smartphones. Mine, I decided, would be my camera, editing suite, GPS, and notebook for the project, which was now informally called “Expedition TTL (To the Lighthouse).”

In a time of strict regulation, I decided that my journey of local discovery should have some rules of its own to provide focus. There were five. First, the only camera hardware I was allowed to use was an Apple iPhone 11. Second, I could only edit the images on a free smartphone app called Snapseed. Third, the expedition was to be propelled only by bicycle and it must take me

to the Mumbles Lighthouse for the journey to count. Fourth, I was limited to one exposure per trip (not one composition, but one click of the shutter). And fifth, of course, it all had to be done within the government guidelines.

While Swansea is officially one of the rainiest towns in the UK, during spring 2020, as I wore my tires down to the canvas, barely a drop of water fell from the sky as I made my way to the lighthouse and back. This I did for 70 consecutive days, every time following a slightly different route that had been meticulously planned the evening before. During this time, I cycled a total of 2,500 kilometers, all carefully recorded in my notebook.

As the days rolled by under the wheels of my bike, I noticed any number of extraordinary things. But the most appealing of all was the constant loud birdsong that went with me everywhere. With hardly a car on the road, wildlife was thriving and making itself heard. I could also hear for the first time the old sea bell out in the shipping lane south of the lighthouse. There were no airplane contrails scratching the sky. Gone was the previously ever-present whiff of fast food, and replacing it was the more subtle aroma of seaweed on the salty breezes. There were meadows of wildflowers. It was as if Swansea had gone back in time and was starting to forgive the modern world for spoiling it. But the biggest difference was the lack of people. And if the resulting book of images, To the Lighthouse, has any lasting value at all, it will probably be because it shows a landscape free from human presence. I don’t think we’ll ever see that again in our lifetimes.

So maybe that is the knowledge I brought back. (To the Lighthouse is available from cover-to-cover.co.uk.)

AT MY JOURNEY’S END, THE LATE EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY MUMBLES LIGHTHOUSE STANDS GUARD OVER THE SHIPPING LANES SOUTH OF SWANSEA BAY, WHILE MY BIKE GETS ENGULFED IN THE ONRUSHING TIDE.

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STORIES CARVED STONE IN

documenting the petroglyphs of Arabia’s great sand seas text and images by CHRISTOPH BAUMER

RETURN OF FL AG Nº136 SINCE ITS FIRST FORAY INTO THE FIELD, WITH ARTHUR L. MYRLAND’S 1949 AFRICAN EXPEDITION, FLAG Nº136 HAS BEEN CARRIED TO THE ANDES AND THE HIGH HIMALAYA. MORE RECENTLY, THE FLAG ACCOMPANIED STEVE PIGOTT ON HIS 2017 RETRACE OF T.E. LAWRENCE’S FAMED 49-HOUR DASH ACROSS THE SINAI PENINSULA—FROM AQABA, JORDAN, TO THE SUEZ CANAL—A CENTURY AGO.

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GREAT NEFUD DESERT HAIL

ARABIAN GULF

TAYMA AL-ULA

RIYADH

SHUWAYMIS LUWEE

RED SEA

RUB' AL-KHALI DESERT JEDDAH HIMA NAJRAN

A FELLOW OF THE E XPLORERS CLUB SINCE 2004, CHRISTOPH BAUMER IS AN INDEPENDENT ARCHAEOLOGY FIELD RESE ARCHER, PHOTOGR APHER, AND AUTHOR. SINCE THE E ARLY 1990S, HIS RESE ARCH HAS FOCUSED ON CENTR AL ASIA , TIBE T, AND THE CAUCASUS. AS FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIE T Y FOR THE E XPLOR ATION OF EUR ASIA , HE HAS LED FIVE INTERNATIONAL E XPEDITIONS INTO THE TAKL AMAK AN DESERT AND, IN 2017, TO THE SAIMALUU TASH MOUNTAIN R ANGE IN K YRGYZSTAN. HE HAS PUBLISHED A FOUR-VOLUME HISTORY OF CENTR AL ASIA AND HIS HISTORY OF THE CAUCASUS IS SL ATED FOR RELE ASE IN SPRING 2021. FOR MORE ON HIS WORK , VISIT: W W W.E XPLOR ATION-EUR ASIA .COM.

With its vast deserts and a hyper-arid climate, the interior of the Arabian Peninsula is one of the most inhospitable places on Earth. It is hard to believe anything once thrived here. To the south lies the 600,000-square-kilometer Rub' al-Khali (“Empty Quarter”), the largest sand desert in the world. To the north is the Nefud al-Kebir (“Great Sand Dune Desert”), a sand sea of more than 100,000 square kilometers ringed by a belt of sandstone cliffs and outcrops. The desert continues to dry as, per year, it receives a scant precipitation level of less than 100 millimeters and endures an extreme evaporation potential of some 4.5 liters. But, as with the Sahara in Africa and the Taklamakan Desert of northwestern

China, climatic conditions in the interior of the Arabian Peninsula have not always been so hostile to life. Recent analysis of ancient lakebed sediments conducted by Adrian Parker, Yamandú Hilbert, Paul Breeze, and others has revealed that over the past 35,000 years, the Arabian Peninsula has experienced dramatic climate fluctuations, with extended periods of time when its deserts were wetter, cooler, and greener, inviting waves of human habitation.

OPENING SPREAD: A HUNTING SCENE DATED TO THE SEVENTH MILLENNIUM BCE FROM JABAL RAAT, SHUWAYMIS. FACING PAGE: DROMEDARIES IN THE REGION OF HIMA IN THE SOUTHWESTERN RUB' AL-KHALI.

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Evidence of the material culture of these erstwhile desert denizens, and the animals they hunted and herded, has survived in an abundance of rock art sites found around paleolakes that have long since vanished from the landscape. Collectively, these sites harbor a rupestrian legacy spanning some 10,000 years that chronicles the transition from a largely hunter-gatherer way of life to a more sedentary one centered around desert oases, which ultimately led to fierce competition for dwindling water resources with those who maintained a life of nomadic pastoralism and those who plied the sands as merchants and traders.

In February, I set out on a two-month expedition to survey and explore dozens of petroglyph sites. For the venture, I was joined by my Swiss colleague, Therese Weber, and two local rock art specialists: Mohammad Abu Ahmad, a reader of North Arabian Thamudic inscriptions who, along with driver and guide Isa al-Jiri, aided us in the Nefud; and Mohammad al-Musir, a Bedouin and reader of South Arabian Musnad inscriptions who would prove invaluable in the Rub' al-Khali. We had two additional drivers to deftly guide our desert-ready four-wheel-drive vehicles through the shifting sands.

In the Nefud, our goal was to follow up on earlier survey work carried out in the 1880s by Charles Huber and Julius Euting. While in the Rub' al-Khali we would trace the earlier exploration conducted by Harry St. John Bridger Philby, Gonzague Ryckmans, and Philippe Lippens in 1951– 1952, and more recently by noted scholars Majeed Khan and Sandra Olsen of the Arabian Rock Art Heritage Project, based at the University of Kansas.

A MUTABLE CLIMATE While Arabia experienced a wet climate between 35,000 and 20,000 years ago, it returned to an arid state during the Late Pleistocene, when its climate came to be much as it is today. Dry desert conditions persisted until the beginning of the Holocene, around 10,000 BCE, when seasonal rains returned to Arabian shores, driven primarily by the Indian Monsoon Current, which began to push its catchment area to the northwest.

By 8500 BCE, seasonal rains regularly fell in the Rub' al-Khali. Within 1,500 to 1,800 years, it began to precipitate over the Nefud—at first in the southeast region of Jubbah then, in time, further west at Tayma.

This seasonal precipitation was on occasion complemented by winter rainfalls brought by Mediterranean westerly cyclones.

Summer monsoon rains transported sediments across the landscape, depositing them in shallow desert depressions, which, in turn, became lakes. With the return of more arid climatic conditions around 3900 BCE, the lakes began to evaporate, vanishing over the course of nearly two millennia. Evidence of these ephemeral lakes remains on the landscape in the form of lacustrine deposits (or paleolakes). And it is around these deposits that the greatest abundance of rock art can be found. Perhaps more important, the gradual waxing and waning of climatic conditions on the Arabian Peninsula is evident in the flora, fauna, and way of life depicted in the incised images—the earliest of which have been dated to the eighth millennium BCE.

HISTORY ETCHED IN STONE As the rain-fed paleolakes formed during the Holocene, the landscape came to resemble more of a savanna than a desert. The reservoirs attracted large carnivores, such as lions and leopards, as well as herbivores—aurochs,

PREVIOUS SPREAD: WADI RIYA' AL-MAQTAL EAST OF AL-ULA. FACING PAGE: A DOUBLE ARCH AT MAHAJAH IN THE NEFUD DESERT.

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long-horned buffalo, lesser kudus, and wild asses—which served as the prime prey for early hunter-gatherers drawn to the area. Not surprisingly, the oldest-known rock art in the region, which has been found in the Nefud, is replete with hunting scenes, including depictions of packs of hunting dogs.

The introduction of domestic cattle and caprids into Arabia from the Levant around 6200 BCE spurred a transition to Neolithic pastoralism, which is reflected in contemporary rock art. Scenes showing the herding of domesticated fauna can be found throughout the southern Nefud, often superimposed on older hunting images. In addition to the difference in iconography, the petroglyphs were executed using different techniques— the whole surface of these early hunting and herding images were often deeply and fully pecked out of the stone, while later scenes were produced by removing the dark brown varnish to reveal the brighter rock underneath, creating the outlines of figures.

Comparison of herding scenes found in the southern Nefud with those of a slightly later date at the sites of Shuwaymis and Luwee, 200 and 350 kilometers further south respectively, suggest a southward expansion of Neolithic pastoralists.

Although the lakes began to dry up and grasslands largely disappeared with the return to more arid conditions at the dawn of the fourth millennium BCE, a few paleolakes continued to be nourished by occasional winter rainfalls, becoming oases. Our expedition experienced such a brief, but torrential winter downpour at the edge of the desert, which was followed by a fierce sandstorm that reduced visibility to 10 meters. We found a few places where small ponds had formed in the wake of the storm. Their location in the immediate vicinity of ancient rock art highlights the close spatial proximity between petroglyphs and access to water.

By the second millennium BCE, desert dwellers had adopted two new economic

strategies in response to drying conditions: establishing settlements sustained through artificial irrigation at the desert edges or taking up nomadic pastoralism. Wild animals all but disappear from rock art of the time save for lions, Nubian ibexes, and oryx.

The domestication of the dromedary around 1200 BCE not only enhanced the mobility of nomadic pastoralists, but led to increased trade, with merchant caravans regularly crossing the great sand seas. With nomads and caravans becoming increasingly dependent on access to water, intense competitions and conflicts soon arose over the control of wells, and a burgeoning business of water-access taxation was born. The introduction of horse breeding in Arabia in the seventh to sixth century BCE contributed to the further “militarization” of desert societies, which is evident in the rock art. Images of cattle have been replaced by those of dromedaries, horses, lancers, and mounted swordsmen.

Battle scenes became dominant. In time, these images would be displaced or overlain by inscriptions and symbols of polytheistic societies and, later still, albeit rarely, with those reflecting the monotheistic practices of the Judeo-Christian period.

As Maria Guagnin of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History has explained, palimpsests of animals and humans make it possible to sketch a relative chronology and to connect it with the absolute dates gained from archaeology. These approximate data are important since, in the desert, archaeological findings of faunal remains are rare.

PREVIOUS PAGE: A DROMEDARY HERD AT JABAL ARNAN, IN THE NEFUD DESERT. FACING PAGE: TOP, EXPEDITION MEMBERS FROM LEFT: THERESE WEBER, CHRISTOPH BAUMER, MOHAMMAD ABU AHMAD, AND ISA AL-JIRI. THEY STAND BEFORE A DEPICTION OF AN ASSYRIAN HORSEMAN AT MISMA SOUTH, IN THE NEFUD DESERT. BOTTOM: HORSEMEN ARE SEEN ATTACKING WITH LONG LANCES IN THIS ROCK ART SCENE AT FARDAT SHEYBAN, HIMA.

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“It was also striking to find here, in the middle of Arabia, the very rare image of a boat.”

studied North Arabian and one southern Arabian pre-Islamic scripts dating from the mid-seventh or sixth century BCE to the mid-third century CE.) We also recorded at least two Nabatean inscriptions. The Nabateans, whose ancient capital of Petra is in present-day Jordan, conquered northern Arabia, including the Nefud and Hegra (al-Ula) around 50 BCE. It was also striking to find here, in the middle of Arabia, the very rare image of a boat. The carving style bears a certain affinity with ancient Egyptian representations.

A cartouche of the pharaoh Ramses III (reigned ca. 1184–1153 BCE) found at Sala’u, some 180 kilometers northwest of Hafirat Laqat, further suggests contacts between central Arabia and Egypt.

A second, shorter ridge at Hafirat Laqat features renderings of two enormous camels, a small lion, ostriches, ibexes, bulls, armed horsemen, hand marks, and Thamudic inscriptions. Two much smaller boulders, 400 meters to the east of these two ridges, are also covered in petroglyphs.

On the western of the two boulders, the expedition found two mysterious double crosses. They consist of a smaller cross within a larger one, whereby the four ends of the outer cross have the shape of an ibex, giving the double crosses the appearance of swastikas. This combination of the Christian cross with the pagan image of

A LAYERED NARRATIVE During our expedition, we investigated two little known, large sites that bore such palimpsests, attesting long-term occupation and dramatic cultural transition. The first, Hafirat Laqat, which was visited briefly by Huber and Euting in 1884, is a vast site in the southern Nefud that is notable as it is in pristine condition and free of vandalism. It consists mainly of a 160-meter-long sandstone ridge that is covered on its eastern side with hundreds of petroglyphs dating from the Late Bronze Age (c. 1800-1100 BCE) to the pre-Islamic period. There we found images of hands, a skeleton, countless camels, a large lion, a wolf, horses, dogs and/or hyenas, ostriches, palm trees, dancing humans, and the Aramaic solar deity slm (“Şulmus”) represented in petroglyphs as a bull’s head seen from the front. Later carvings show mounted lancers, swordsmen, and archers. In addition, we identified numerous inscriptions in Thamudic. (The modern term “Thamudic” is the collective name for five ancient and incompletely

TOP: AN IRON AGE ROCK ART SCENE RENDERED ON THE NORTHERN HALF OF THE MAIN RIDGE AT HAFIRAT LAQAT, IN THE NEFUD DESERT, SHOWS TWO STYLIZED DROMEDARIES. BOTTOM: A PETROGLYPH DEPICTING A LION AT RIYA AZLEK, JABAL ARNAN IN THE NEFUD DESERT.

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an ibex is highly unusual, yet the Christian context seems undeniable.

Between the boulders and the ridges lies a bedrock basin—its lacustrine sediments evidence of a former paleolake. Aeolian erosion has transformed this erstwhile lake bed into a sea of yardangs—geomorphic tabular formations. The winds have removed the softer material, leaving behind relatively harder material. Seen from a distance, they look like inverted boat hulls.

Such a paleolake was a gathering place for nomadic peoples, their herds, and wild animals. Its importance is underscored by the fact that 95 percent of all petroglyphs found at the site faced the ephemeral lake, while the other sides of the ridges and boulders are virtually devoid of rock art.

A second rock art site with abundant deep-time evidence of occupation, and located close to a water source, is Jabal Abu Mughair, some 20 kilometers north of Hafirat Laqat. It lies on top of a sandstone hill overlooking a vast sea of sand, dotted with basalt outcrops. At the center of the site is a spring that feeds several dozen palm trees. Here, the petroglyphs span some 6,000 years—from the Neolithic to late pre-Islamic period. These include a number of Neolithic hunters rendered in the “Jubbah” style, holding non-returning hunting boomerangs and bows. They have tall and slim bodies, thin arms, and tiny heads adorned with headdresses that resemble hammers. Among the Early Bronze Age images, dated to around 3100 BCE, are callipygian men and women; at least three birthing scenes; ithyphallic hunters shooting arrows; and a wild ass and long-horn buffalo. These relatively early images are complemented by Late Bronze Age renderings of leopards, snakes, lizards, ibexes, and still later Thamudic and Nabatean inscriptions, along with a menorah, attesting a Jewish presence in the mid to late first millennium CE.

OF GODS AND MEN While our expedition encountered numerous signs and symbols evincing the transition from polytheism to monotheism following the arrival of Judaism and later Christianity on the Arabian Peninsula, nowhere was the competition between the faiths more evident than in Rub' al-Khali.

Christianity began to take hold here in the late fourth century CE, having been introduced by the Byzantine bishop Theophilus Indus, who had been sent by the Roman Emperor Constantius II to convert Yemen’s Himyarite Kingdom in 354 CE. While exploring the Hima and Kaukab regions in the southwestern part of the Rub' al-Khali, we found several Himyaritic inscriptions in the Ancient South Arabian script called Musnad. At the northern end of a 40-meter-long, concave boulder at a site known as the Gar al-Sidiri, we discovered two Maltese crosses carved next to three names—the two upper ones read “Sajm” and “Sadi,” the lower one most probably “SML,” that is “Samuel.”

Twenty kilometers south of Gar al-Sidiri, at Bir Hima (whose name means “well of Hima”), there is a Himyaritic royal rock inscription that measures 4 meters by 1.2 meters and is dated to 523 CE. It proclaims the victories achieved by the Jewish king Yusuf As'ar Yath'ar, aka Dhu Nuwas, in his campaign against rebellious regions, including the Christian trading hub of Najran, some 90 kilometers south of Gar al-Sidiri.

TOP: AT JABAL ABU MUGHAIR, IN THE SOUTHERN NEFUD, THE EXPEDITION FOUND ABUNDANT THAMUDIC AND NABATEAN INSCRIPTIONS, ALONG WITH A MENORAH, ATTESTING THE JEWISH PRESENCE IN THE MID TO LATE FIRST MILLENNIUM CE. BOTTOM: AN OUTCROP BEARING A DEPICTION OF A CRUCIFIXION WAS FOUND NOT FAR FROM RENDERINGS OF WHAT MAY BE A TORC-WEARING MOON GODDESS, A MUSICIAN, AND A WARRIOR AT WADI AL-NAQHA IN THE RUB' AL-KHALI.

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The four famous and ancient neighboring wells of Bir Hima stand near a former paleolake. The group that controlled access to the wells not only derived substantial wealth from them, but also had to be permanently prepared to fight for this privilege. This is clear in the hundreds of petroglyphs around this and neighboring sites, which feature fights and battle scenes involving cavalry, camel drivers, and infantry. The preferred weapons were light and long lances, flails, swords, sabers, curved daggers, and bows. Images of naked females with long braids and arms lifted to the sky—probably representations of a war goddess—appear in the battle scene.

The unique carving on a boulder of a 1.3-meter-high female wearing short braids, a torc, and a long dress adorns a boulder in the Wadi al-Naqha, less than 20 kilometers northwest of Bir Hima. A crescent moon is carved above her left shoulder.

She may have been a Moon deity. To her left, a kneeling woman plays a lyre, and next to the musician stands a life-size warrior holding three spears and wearing a cuirass.

On an outcrop a few kilometers distant, a crucifix is featured over what looks like the curved horns of an ibex. The 15-cm-high, crucified body and the drooping head are easily recognizable. The legs of this figure are overlain by an image of a cross of later date. Such highly charged images were an unexpected find in the western Rub' al-Khali, but nonetheless underscored the rich and layered cultural heritage of this ancient and environmentally mutable landscape.

A CARVING AT WADI AL-NAQHA IN THE RUB' AL-KHALI DEPICTS A FEMALE WITH SHORT BRAIDS, WEARING A TORC AND A LONG DRESS. A CRESCENT MOON CARVED ABOVE HER LEFT SHOULDER SUGGESTS THAT SHE MAY BE A MOON DEITY. TO HER LEFT ARE A KNEELING WOMAN PLAYING A LYRE AND A LIFE-SIZE WARRIOR HOLDING THREE SPEARS AND WEARING A CUIRASS.

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HARVESTING THE WILD

reindeer food

by LES STROUD and CHEF PAUL ROGALSKI

THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

When we endeavored to produce an episode of Wild Harvest in Temagami, Ontario, we immediately encountered a snag: Option anxiety! There was just so much to choose from in the wild that we found it hard to stop at two or three ingredients when it came to showcasing an abundance of wild blueberries, which are, pound-for-pound, far more flavorful than any domesticated variety.

Here we offer a simple layered dish with complex and complimentary flavors that packs a punch. To prepare it, you will need a bowl, a whisk, and a heavy cast-iron skillet.

The dish is best made over an open fire with a sturdy grill grate, but you will need to manage the heat effectively and be ready to move quickly. The delicious browned butter we include is fat and fat can ignite.

wild blueberries with whipped sour cream, botanical syrup, crispy reindeer lichen, and beaked hazelnuts in browned butter SERVES 4

In a bowl, whip cream until soft peaks form.

Add honey and a pinch of salt and stir in sour cream. Spoon cream mixture evenly among four serving dishes and spread around with the back of the spoon. Add a layer of blueberries to each dish and drizzle with 2 tablespoons of the botanical syrup.

2 CUPS OF W ILD BLUEBERRIES, CLE ANED

BOTANICAL SYRUP (MAKE IN ADVANCE, YIELDS APPROXIMATELY 1¾ CUPS)

2 2 1 ¼ ¼ 2 1

cups of white sugar cups of water handful of sarsaparilla, smashed cup of sweetgale leaves cup of sweet fern leaves lemons, juiced pinch of salt

CRISPY REINDEER LICHEN & BEAKED HAZELNUTS IN BROWNED BUTTER 6 1 4 1

In a medium-sized pot, add water, lemon juice, sugar, a pinch of salt, and the sarsaparilla. Bring to a simmer and add the sweetgale and sweet fern. Continue simmering until reduced to of the original volume. Allow to cool. Strain and set aside.

Melt butter in a pan over medium-high heat.

Once the butter starts to foam, add the lichen and crisp it quickly. (This should take only 30–60 seconds.) Remove the lichen from the pan and sprinkle it with sugar. Add the hazelnuts to the melted butter and fry until slightly brown.

Remove nuts from heat and spoon over the whipped sour cream, blueberries, and botanical syrup. Top with crispy reindeer lichen. Enjoy!

WHIPPED SOUR CREAM 1 1 3 1

tablespoons of butter, unsalted cup of reindeer lichen, cleaned and torn in small pieces tablespoons of beaked hazelnut meat dusting of sugar

cup of whipping cream (36% butter fat minimum) cup of sour cream tablespoons of liquid honey pinch of salt

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EXTREME MEDICINE YOUR HEALTH AND SAFETY IN THE FIELD

collateral damage

assessing the impact of the coronavirus on wildlife populations

by MICHAEL J. MANYAK, M.D., FACS

Various aspects of viral infection with SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus (Covid-19) have dominated the news cycle for several months now, yet some may find it rather difficult to sift out the accurate data from speculation or myth as we await release of a viable vaccine. What is evident is that we are in the fourth inning of a nine-inning game. Thwarting this disease will require a combined approach with goals of improved detection, an effective vaccine, and development of treatment. Until these are accomplished, with at least partial herd immunity and effective treatment, travel and most exploration will be on the back burner due to regulations and restrictions on international travel. When travel does resume, we must be aware of the implications of disease spread.

Covid-19 infects human cells through activation of two receptors. The first, the ACE2 receptors, are present in blood vessels, heart, brain, kidney, lung, intestines, and upper nasal passages. The second, TMPRSS2, is also widely present in tissues and is activated by male hormones. Many effects of the disease are manifested because of blood vessel damage.

While we learn more about the disease and its presentations in humans, little attention has been paid to the effects of it on other animals, save for a few curious researchers, including Explorers Club Fellow and Lowell Thomas awardee Martin Nweeia, who, for nearly two decades, has done field research in the Arctic on narwhals. His work is highlighted in a permanent exhibit in the Smithsonian National 72

Museum of Natural History. He belongs to a consortium of genetic researchers who have just published an extensive evaluation of ACE2 receptors in vertebrates in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Their research built on previous findings that coronaviruses SARS-CoV (the original SARS) and SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) likely had ancestors that arose in bats. This was followed by transmission to an intermediate host in an extended host range that includes primates and other mammals. The authors cite literature that at least one different human coronavirus (HCoV-OC43) appears to have originated in cattle or swine and was associated with a human pandemic that emerged in the late nineteenth century. Furthermore, it is now known that coronaviruses can be transmitted from bats to other wildlife species and humans, and from humans to tigers and pigs.

Why is this important? It is essential to understand the host range of these coronaviruses to improve the ability to predict and control future pandemics. For all of us who interact with other species, whether in domestic or remote locations, this information is critical when it comes to protecting wildlife in native habitats and under human care, particularly nonhuman primates, which may be susceptible to Covid-19. This is especially true for endangered species, where a disease can decimate small populations like narwhals or great apes.

The extent of the potential for Covid-19 to infect vertebrates is staggering. The research group evaluated 410 species (252 mammals, 72 birds, 65 fishes, 17 reptiles, and 4 amphibians) using a scoring scale that rated each species according to the ability for coronavirus to bind to 25 different known binding sites. The scoring scale categories ranged from very high and high to medium, low, and very low. The

higher the score, the higher the probability of becoming infected. The 18 animals in the “very high” category were all Old World primates and great apes. There are 28 species in the high category: 12 whale and dolphin species, 7 rodents, 3 deer, 3 lemur species (primates), 2 anteater species, and an Old World monkey. Nine of 43 carnivore species scored medium on the scale, while another 9 scored low and 25 scored very low.

The carnivores scoring medium were exclusively cat species, including the domestic cat and Siberian tiger. Also scoring medium were several important wild and domesticated hoofed animals, such as domesticated cattle, bison, sheep, goat, water buffalo, Masai giraffe, and the Tibetan antelope. Interestingly, all bats scored low or very low, including the bat suspected of being the culprit intermediate host for transmission of the coronavirus to humans. This paradoxical last finding strongly supports further study of transmission in animals and proof that their ACE2 receptor expression correlates with acquiring the disease.

This complexity of transmission may include other routes of infection. Given that 25 percent of Covid-19 patients have diarrhea and 34 percent have nausea/vomiting, poorly controlled sewage disposal systems portend potentially disastrous impacts on animal populations in addition to humans.

Clearly, we need to learn more about this.

This research has greatly expanded the number of candidate intermediate hosts and identified many additional threatened species that could be at risk for SARSCoV-2 infection via their ACE2 receptors.

Furthermore, this is believed to be the first study in conservation that has proactively identified a potential high risk based on specific species genetic expression. It will be fascinating to see how the line of research undertaken by Nweeia and his colleagues further develops.

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BOOK REVIEWS EDITED BY MILBRY C. POLK

LAND OF WONDROUS COLD

BY GILLEN D’ARCY WOOD

312 PP • PRINCETON: PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2020 • ISBN-13: 978-0691172200 • $27.95 • REVIEWED BY NICK SMITH

If ever there was a place that unites humanity’s twin obsessions with exploration and scientific discovery, it is Antarctica. And if ever there was a book that simultaneously looked into these two subjects with expertise and enthusiasm, it is Gillen D’Arcy Wood’s Land of Wondrous Cold that describes the unfolding drama of the White Continent’s role in plate tectonics, climate change, and evolution.

Of course, we came to know of these phenomena largely due to the early exertions of human exploration, most notably in the nineteenth century, when the likes of James Clark Ross, Jules Dumont d’Urville, and Charles Wilkes were pushing back the frontiers of both geographical exploration and scientific knowledge. While the general public will tend to think that Antarctica is all about the likes of explorers such as Robert Falcon Scott and Sir Ernest Shackleton just before the outbreak of the First World War, Wondrous Cold takes us back to what happened before that era, while cleverly interweaving modern field science that would have been so alien to the early pioneers: ice cap instability, rising sea levels, and the Ocean Drilling Program.

And this is the strength of Wood’s book, flicking back and forth from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, examining key episodes that link these fabled voyages of discovery to the modern era of polar research. It is gripping and informative to the last page.

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THE WORLD BENE ATH THEIR FEET

BY SCOTT ELLSWORTH

416 PP • NEW YORK: LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY, 2020 • ISBN-13: 9780316434867 • $30 • REVIEWED BY ANGELA M.H. SCHUSTER

When Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay hauled themselves up onto the 8,848-meter summit of Everest at 11:30 in the morning on May 29, 1953, it was a mountaineering achievement more than three decades in the making, and the realization of a dream shared by explorers since the dawn of time—to step where no one had stepped before.

BOOK RE VIE WS

In his poetically penned new volume, The World Beneath Their Feet, Scott Ellsworth delves into the mystique and allure of the Himalayas and, by extension, the Karakoram Range to the west. Collectively, these mountain ranges stretch more than 3,200 kilometers—from the Hindu Kush of eastern Afghanistan to the far reaches of western China—and harbor all 14 of Earth’s peaks towering above 8,000 meters, the most famous, of course, being Everest and K2. “Twice as high as the Alps or the Rockies,” writes Ellsworth, “these were true geographical monsters, behemoths of rock and ice so large that they create their own weather systems.”

The author chronicles 29 international expeditions that have set out to summit these formidable peaks, often against the highly charged geopolitical landscape that has loomed over the Roof of the World since the dark years leading up to World War II— tensions that persist down to the present day. Notable among these efforts was the Third American Karakoram Expedition of 1953, which was led by Charles Houston.

Though its members failed to achieve their objective—the summit of K2, which would be attained by an Italian team led by Ardito Desio in July 1954—the expedition

has been hailed for its exquisite planning, teamwork, and perseverance. Climbing legend Reinhold Messner has summed it up thus: “I have great respect for the Italians who summited K2 for the first time in 1954, but even greater respect for the Americans and the way they failed in 1953. They were decent. They were strong. And they failed in the most beautiful way you can imagine.”

THE BOOK OF EELS

BY PATRIK SVENSSON

256 PP • NEW YORK: ECCO, 2020 • ISBN-10: 0062968815 • ISBN-13: 9780062968814 • $28.99

Through the centuries, eels have largely evaded scientific study, simply because they are so difficult to observe, hiding in mud, emerging in darkness, traveling great distances, and over the course of their lives morphing into seemingly

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different animals. And, as we learn in Patrik Svensson’s latest offering, The Book of Eels, they are indeed among Earth’s most curious creatures. Eels, the author tells us, begin their lives in the densely carpeted seaweed beds in the Sargasso Sea, a place in the eastern Atlantic surrounded by powerful currents, where things “don’t have an easy time getting out.” There, tiny larvae— each one flat and transparent like a “willow leaf”—are born and begin a three-year journey, drifting toward the shores of Europe, where they will morph into glass eels before setting a course for freshwater rivers. Once there, they morph again, this time into yellow-brown eels that will then travel hundreds of nautical miles inland to find a home in a muddy stream where they will live out a solitary existence for perhaps a half-century, after which they morph yet again, becoming black silvery eels that will return where their lives began in the Sargasso Sea to procreate.

Throughout his narrative, Svensson intersperses musings on eels in history, culture, literature, science, and exploration with charming stories about his boyhood, which he spent fishing for eels with his father. He discusses various beliefs about eels, including those of Aristotle, who was fascinated

BOOK RE VIE WS

by eels, studied them, and thought they sprung up out of mud, “brought into existence by rainwater.” He also tells the story of explorer and scientist Johannes Schmidt, who, in 1904, set sail on what would become an 18-yearlong voyage—interrupted by World War I—on which he sought to unravel the mystery of the eel’s hatching grounds.

Svensson describes eel festivals, provides eel recipes, and takes a deep dive into “eel culture,” as it is manifest along Sweden’s eel coast, which is dotted with sheds used by fishermen who prey on the big fat silver eels as they make their way back to the Sargasso Sea. In Spain’s Basque Country, eel fishermen wait at the mouths of rivers to catch the glass eels swimming upstream in search of a muddy home.

In America, eels have been credited with saving the starving pilgrims. Sadly, today where eels were once abundant, they are a rare commodity.

Fundamental questions remain about eels, such as how they reproduce and why they journey to the Sargasso Sea, although to date not a single silver eel has been found there.

Svensson provides great insight, while leaving us with many tantalizing mysteries about eels—exquisite mysterious animals that may be on the verge of extinction.

SEAWEED

BY MIEK ZWAMBORN

192 PP • VANCOUVER: GREYSTONE BOOKS, 2020 • ISBN-10: 1771645997 • ISBN-13: 978-1771645997 • $26.95

Seaweed is one of the oldest plants on Earth, clocking in at 1.7 billion years. It is found throughout the ocean, and patches of it have often been likened to underwater forests, providing habitats for fish and other marine animals, while serving as an important food source that has the capacity to sequester carbon and produce oxygen.

In Seaweed, Dutch author and artist Miek Zwamborn takes the reader through the world of seaweed, and a fascinating one it is. She opens the book with a brief overview of the types of seaweed, discussing green, red, and brown varieties; diatoms; dinoflagellates (what we often call red tide); bluegreen algae, which are more of a bacteria; and the tiny haptophyta and crytomonas.

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She includes an extensive discussion of sargassum, a brown seaweed from which the Sargasso Sea gets its name. Growing in “forests along coastlines,” sargassum provides shelter for some species yet it is notorious for wreaking havoc on ships and other sea creatures.

Explorers from Pytheas of Massalia to Alexander von Humboldt wrote about their encounters with sargassum.

Seaweed, she writes, has played a critical role in coastal cultures around the world, being an ideal material from which one can fashion utilitarian objects like baskets or even thatch a roof.

Perhaps more than anything, she says, seaweed has proven resilient. No matter how long seaweed has been dried, it regains it elasticity when placed in water. And the robust green algae harvested in Norway has continued to thrive on a panel on the exterior of the International Space Station, despite exposure to extreme temperatures and being bombarded by cosmic rays.

Seaweed of this sort is now being studied for potential uses on Mars.

She concludes the book with a discussion of the dietary and medicinal properties of seaweed and includes a number of recipes along with “portraits” of key varieties and information on where they are found.

THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

SPACEFARERS

BY CHRISTOPHER WANJEK

400 PP • CAMBRIDGE: HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2020 • ISBN-10: 067498448X • ISBN-13: 9780674984486 • $29.95

Christopher Wanjek, a former senior writer for the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, has penned a compelling new book, Spacefarers: How Humans Will Settle the Moon, Mars, and Beyond, clearly with the next generation in mind, knowing that they will be the first to journey beyond the Moon. While space colonization “looks good on paper and in the animated videos,” he writes, the reality is that much needs to be worked out to ensure such efforts wouldn’t be suicide missions.

Space colonization will be neither instant nor magical, he says, noting that beyond sourcing in space the necessities to support human

life—water and oxygen—formidable challenges remain when it comes to the logistics of dealing with temperature extremes, exposure to toxic soils and cosmic radiation, and planning for catastrophic technological breakdowns.

Wanjek opens his volume with a brief history of space exploration to lay the groundwork for where we are today—which he writes is not nearly as far as we thought we would be 50 years ago.

As recent advances in space exploration have been driven largely by hoped-for profits from mining and tourism, the author devotes much of the book to the engineers, scientists, and entrepreneurs striving to make the settling of other worlds a reality.

Included is a discussion of analogous environments on Earth that are serving as proving grounds for new technologies—chiefly in Antarctica and on high-desert plateaus. Most interestingly, he discusses visionary ideas that will make life off planet possible, including the building of cities that “float” above the clouds on the “most habitable planet” beyond Earth—Venus. Our destiny, Wanjek contends, is in the stars and we will likely have outposts on both the Moon and Mars by the end of the century if the next generation of scientists and explorers is able to achieve much of what he has outlined.

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OWNERSHIP STATEMENT 1. Publication Title: THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL. 2. Publication Number: 0014-5025.

3. Filing Date: 09/30/20. 4. Issue Frequency: Quarterly. 5. Number of Issues Published Annually: 4. 6. Annual Subscription Price: $48. 7. Complete Mailing Address of Known Office of Publication: The Explorers Club, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021-4928. 8. Complete Mailing Address of Headquarters or General Business Office of Publisher: The Explorers Club, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021-4928. 9. Full Names and Complete Mailing Addresses of Publisher, Editor, and Managing Editor: Publisher: Richard Wiese, President & Publisher, The Explorers Club, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 100214928. Editor: Angela M.H. Schuster, The Explorers Club, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021-4928. Managing Editor: N/A. 10. Owner: The Explorers Club, 46 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021-4928. 11. Known Bondholders, Mortgagees, and Other Security Holders Owning or Holding 1 Percent or More of Total Amount of Bonds, Mortgages, or Other Securities: None. 12. Tax Status: The purpose, function, and nonprofit status of this organization and the exempt status for federal income tax purposes has not changed during preceding 12 months.

13. Publication Title: THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL. 14. Issue Date for Circulation Data Below: Summer 2020. 15. Extent and Nature of Circulation: a. Average Number of Copies Each Issue During Preceding 12 Months: 4,613. Number of Copies of Single Issue Published Nearest to Filing Date: 4,500. b. Paid Circulation: (1) Mailed Outside-County Paid Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541: 3,535.

(2) Mailed In-County Paid Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541: 294. (3) Paid Distribution Outside the Mail, Including Sales Through Dealers and Carriers, Street Vendors, Counter Sales, and Other Paid Distribution Outside USPS®: 0. (4) Paid Distribution by Other Classes of Mail Through the USPS: 0. c. Total Paid Distribution: 3,829. d. Free or Nominal Rate Distribution: (1) Free or Nominal Rate Outside-County Copies included on PS Form 3541: 0. (2) Free or Nominal Rate In-County Copies Included on PS Form 3541: 0. (3) Free or Nominal Rate Copies Mailed at Other Classes Through the USPS: 0. (4) Free or Nominal Rate Distribution Outside the Mail: 189. e. Total Free or Nominal Rate Distribution: 189. f. Total Distribution: 4.018. g. Copies not Distributed: 482. h. Total: 4,500. i. Percent Paid: 95%. 16. a. Paid Electronic Copies: 281. b. Total Paid Print Copies: 4,110. c. Total Print Distribution+Paid Electronic Copies: 4,299. d. Percent Paid (Both Print & Electronic Copies): 95.6%. 17. This Statement of Ownership will be printed in the Fall 2020 edition of this publication. 18. I certify that all information furnished on this form is true and complete: Angela M.H. Schuster, editor, THE EXPLORERS JOURNAL.

THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

chapter chairs THE E XPL ORERS CLUB 46 EAST 70TH STREET, NEW YORK, NY 10021 WWW.EXPLORERS.ORG | 212-628-8383

AFRICA Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka gladys@ctph.org

FLORIDA Joseph Dituri, PhD joe@gallantaquatic.com

NORTHERN CALIFORNIA Lesley Ewing lesleycoastal@gmail.com

SOUTHERN FLORIDA Bruce C. Matheson bcm09@bellsouth.net

AL ASK A Mead Treadwell meadwell@alaska.net

GEORGE ROGERS CL ARK Leonard A. Weakley, Jr. lweakley@rendigs.com

NORWAY Synnøve Marie Kvam Strømsvåg explorers.norge@gmail.com

SOUTHWEST Robert Louis DeMayo rdemayo07@aol.com

ATL ANTA Steve Pigott jagter@msn.com

GREAT BRITAIN & IREL AND Mark Wood, Chair mark@markwoodexplorer.com Rory Golden, Vice Chair rgolden@eircom.net www.britishexplorersclub.org

PACIFIC NORTHWEST John All, PhD john.all@wwu.edu

ST. LOUIS Cynthia Peters cynthiaspeters@gmail.com

PHIL ADELPHIA A.J. “Buddy” Obara, Jr. ajo_@msn.com

SWEDEN Lars E. Larsson llarsson@explorersclub.se

POL AND Mariusz Ziółkowski mziolkowski@uw.edu.pl www.explorersclubpoland.pl

SWITZERL AND Laurent Develle ldevelle37@gmail.com switzerland@explorers.org

ROCK Y MOUNTAIN Jeff Blumenfeld jeff@blumenfeldpr.com www.explorers-rm.org

TEX AS Nancy McGee nancy@islandtimescuba.com

AUSTRALIA & NEW ZEAL AND Todd Tai todd@mivision.com.au BHUTAN Matthew DeSantis matt@mybhutan.com CANADA George Kourounis chapterchair@explorersclub.ca CENTRAL & SOUTH AMERICA OPEN

GREATER PIEDMONT Phil Bartlett mfbartlett@gmail.com HAWAII Mark Blackburn mblackburn@aol.com HONG KONG Angelica Angles aangles@explorershk.org

CHICAGO/GREAT L AKES Robert A. Shuchman, PhD shuchman@mtu.edu

NEW ENGL AND Gregory Deyermenjian paititi@alumni.clarku.edu

EAST & SOUTH ASIA Steven R. Schwankert steven@sinoscuba.com

NORTH PACIFIC AL ASK A Joshua C. Lewis & Victoria M. Becwar-Lewis npac1@me.com

SAN DIEGO Dr. Timothy A. Radke timothy.a.radke@gmail.com SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA Charles Carmona explorersclubsocal@gmail.com David Dolan DavidDolan@aol.com

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WASHINGTON, DC Bruce Molnia glaciers@verizon.net www.explorersclubdc.org WESTERN EUROPE Ief Winckelmans westerneurope@explorers.org

THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

legacy society THERE ARE FEW THINGS MORE IMPORTANT IN THE WORLD TODAY THAN THE EXPLORERS CLUB MISSION TO DISCOVER AND EDUCATE. OUR MEMBERS STRIVE, THROUGH SCIENCE, TO BETTER UNDERSTAND THIS WORLD AND SOMETIMES FIND NEW ONES. THE ENDOWMENT CREATED BY THE LEGACY SOCIETY WILL HELP ENSURE THAT THIS MISSION CONTINUES. EXPLORATION IS NOT ALWAYS EASY, HOWEVER, PLANNING TO GIVE TO THE LEGACY SOCIETY IS. I HOPE YOU WILL JOIN ME!

—MARC BRYAN-BROWN, MR’95

Mark R. Allio • John G. Alexander • Alan B. Albright • Robert J. Atwater • Capt. Norman L. Baker* • Barbara Ballard • Robert D. Ballard, PhD • Samuel B. Ballen* • Mark Gregory Bayuk • Daniel A. Bennett • Josh Bernstein • Bruce Blanchard • John R. Bockstoce, DPhil • Jack Aaron Boggs • Bjorn G. Bolstad* • Capt. Bruce M. Bongar, PhD • Brian M. Boom, PhD • Jill Botway • Garrett R. Bowden • Capt. Lawson W. Brigham, PhD, USCG (ret.) • Harry Davis Brooks • Lt. Col. Jewell Richard Browder* • August “Augie” Brown* • John C.D. Bruno • Marc Bryan-Brown • Lee R. Bynum* • Virginia Castagnola Hunter • Julianne M. Chase, PhD • James M. Chester* • James Thomas Chirurg • Maj. Gen. Arthur W. Clark, USAF (ret.) • Capt. William Clark* • Steven Cohen, PhD (hon.) • Leslie E. Colby* • Jonathan M. Conrad • Catherine Nixon Cooke • Sandra B. Cook, PhD • S. Allen Counter, PhD, D.M.Sc.* • John Craparo • Lynn D. Danaher • Constance Difede • David A. Dolan, MA, MPH, M.Div. • Mr. & Mrs. James Donovan • Col. William H. Dribben, USA (ret.)* • Amelia Earhart* • Sylvia A. Earle, PhD • Edwin L. Ecclestone, Jr. • James M. Edwards, MD • Lee M. Elman • Alan Feldstein • Michael L. Finn • Robert L. Fisher, PhD • John W. Flint* • Capt. Joel Fogel • Kay Foster • James M. Fowler* • W. Roger Fry* • Max Gallimore • Richard Garriott de Cayeux • Char Glacy • Alfred C. Glassell, Jr.* • George W. Gowen • Randall A. Greene • Susan Ross Grimaldi • Jean Charles Michel Guite • Les Guthman • Capt. Robert “Rio” Hahn • Penrose Hallowell • Allan C. Hamilton • Scott W. Hamilton • O. Winston “Bud” Hampton, PhD • Brian P. Hanson • James H. Hardy, MD • Ira Haupt, II • Judith Heath* • Robert A. Hemm • Gary “Doc” Hermalyn, PhD • Sir Edmund P. Hillary, KG, ONZ, KBE* • John A. Hodge • Carlota “Lotsie” Clark Hermann Holton • Christy Holton Hubbard • L. Ron Hubbard* • Charles B. Huestis* • Robert Edgar Hyman • J.P. Morgan Charitable Trust • Robert M. Jackson, MD • Theodore P. Janulis • Linn E. Johnson • Kenneth Kambis, PhD • Kenneth M. Kamler, MD • Prince Joli Kansil • Lorie M.L. Karnath, MBA, PhD (hon.) • Anthony G. Kehle, III • Anne B. Keiser • Kathryn Kiplinger • Martin Klein • Thomas R. Kuhns, MD • Carl C. Landegger • Leon “Lee” V. Langan • John R. Lawrence • Robert M. Lee* • Michael S. Levin • Florence Lewisohn Trust • J. Roland Lieber • James E. Lockwood, Jr.* • Jose Loeb • John H. Loret, PhD, DSc* • Margaret D Lowman, PhD • Michael Luzich • Daniel J. Lyons • Robert H. Malott* • Leslie Mandel* • Robert E. Maroney • Michele Mass, MD • Robert E. McCarthy* • George E. McCown • Lorus T. Milne, PhD* • James M. Mitchelhill* • Arnold H. Neis • Nancy Nenow • Virginia E. Newell • Walter P. Noonan • Alan H. Nichols • Martin T. Nweeia, D.D.S. • Dr. John W. Olsen • Kathleen Parker • Alese* & Morton Pechter* • Cynthia S. Peters • William E. Phillips* • David S. Press • Prof. Mabel L. Purkerson, MD • Roland R. Puton • Timothy A. Radke, MD • Dimitri Rebikoff* • Mabel Dorn Reeder* • John T. Reilly, PhD • Adrian Richards, PhD • Bruce E. Rippeteau, PhD • Merle Greene Robertson, PhD* • Otto E. Roethenmund • James Beeland Rogers, Jr. • Faanya L. Rose • William J. Roseman • Rudy L. Ruggles, Jr. • Gene Rurka • Wayne J. Safro • David J. Saul, PhD* • Willets H. Sawyer, III • A. Harvey Schreter* • Donald L. Segur* • Margaret Segur* • Walter Shropshire, Jr., PhD, MDiv. • Richard T. Silver, MD • Robert H.I. Silver* • Theodore M. Siouris • William J. L. Sladen, MD, DPhil* • Susan Deborah Smilow • Capt. David D. Smith, PhD, USNR (ret.) • Mark A. Smith* • Ernest R. Sohns* • Sally A. Spencer* • Ronnie & Allan Streichler • Arthur O. Sulzberger* • Vernon F. Taylor, III • Mitchell Terk, MD • Lowell Thomas, Jr.* • C. Frederick (Rick) Thompson • James “Buddy” Thompson • Edward B. Tucker, MBE* • Wendy Tucker • Edmund S. Twining, III • Marc Verstraete Van de Weyer • William F. Vartorella, PhD, C.B.C. • Robert C. Vaughn • Ann Marks Volkwein • Alexander Wallace • Julia M. Wallace • Don Walsh, PhD • Johnny Waters • Leonard A. Weakley, Jr. • William G. Wellington, PhD* • James S. Westerman • Robert H. Whitby • Julius Wile* • Holly Williams • Francis A. Wodal* • Lindley Kirksey Young • Eric Zember • Santo (Sandy) Zicaro * Deceased

THE LEGACY SOCIE T Y COMMIT TEE

THE E XPLORERS CLUB

David A. Dolan (Chair), Robert J. Atwater, Brian M. Boom, James M. Edwards, Alan Feldstein, Kay Foster, George W. Gowen, Penrose “Pen” Hallowell, Scott W. Hamilton, Brian P. Hanson, Virginia Newell, Walter P. Noonan, Mabel L. Purkerson, Timothy A. Radke, Faanya L. Rose, David D. Smith, and Eric Zember

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46 East 70th Street New York, NY 10021 212-628-8383 for additional info: www.explorers.org

THE E XPLORERS JOURNAL

WHAT WERE THEY THINKING? GREAT MOMENTS IN EXPLORATION AS TOLD TO JIM CLASH

Kelly Drennan Walsh deep thoughts

ON JANUARY 23, 1960, DON WALSH AND JACQUES PICARD, ABOARD THE BATHYSCAPHE TRIESTE, BECAME THE FIRST HUMANS TO REACH CHALLENGER DEEP AT THE BOTTOM OF THE MARIANA TRENCH. ELEVEN KILOMETERS BELOW THE SURFACE OF THE PACIFIC OCEAN, IT IS THE DEEPEST PLACE ON EARTH. EARLIER THIS YEAR, DON’S SON, KELLY DRENNAN WALSH, REPEATED THE DIVE WITH VICTOR VESCOVO IN THE SUBMERSIBLE LIMITING FACTOR. WE CAUGHT UP WITH KELLY, 52, IN THE WAKE OF HIS DIVE.

JC: You went a little deeper than your father.

KDW: He was never protective of records, nor is he interested in measuring success by feet or time-at-depth.

His hope is that this type of exploration can be commonplace, and he’s quite pleased that we are finally in a place, technologically, where regular, repeatable dives of this sort are possible. So 10,912 meters [Trieste] compared to my 10,928 meters, it’s apples and hand grenades.

JC: What did you see on the bottom?

KDW: I was looking down at NOTHING—fine silt, some rocks, and an undulating seafloor— with the knowledge that only a few people have seen this landscape. It was amazing.

No life-forms, a soda can, and some cabling.

JC: Any fear about—or on—the dive?

KDW: None. Aside from the proven design of the vessel and the heroics of the team at Triton Submarines, just the thought of me repeating the dive that my dad did back in 1960 was enough to allay all fears. Frankly, my most anxiety-producing moments were the logistics of travel during a pandemic. Having to get tested, fly, and shelter in place until embarking the ship was the most mentally challenging part of the dive. On the day of the descent, I was calm, focused, and contemplative.

JC: What’s it like going down?

KDW: The descent is remarkable as the light fades and we drop quickly through the water column. I recall Victor mentioning we were just passing the crush depth of naval submarines, the depth of the Titanic, and so forth. It took four hours to reach the bottom, but we didn’t travel at a consistent speed. The water gets more dense as we go, so we slowed quite a bit as time passed. Finally reaching the seafloor was a stunning moment for me.

A fellow of The Explorers Club since 1999, Jim Clash is the author of The Right Stuff: Interviews with Icons of the 1960s .

KELLY DRENNAN WALSH EMERGES FROM THE DSV LIMITING FACTOR . IMAGE COURTESY MIKE MOORE/EYOS EXPEDITIONS.

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From vast ocean depths to the frontiers of outer space, The Explorers Journal offers firsthand reporting from those pushing the limits of knowledge and human endurance.

Founded in 1904 to promote exploration “by all means possible,” The Explorers Club is an international organization dedicated to the advancement of field exploration and scientific inquiry. Among our members are leading pioneers in oceanography, mountaineering, archaeology, and the planetary and environmental sciences.

“SURVIVORMAN” LES STROUD SETS OUT FOR SEVEN DAYS OF SURVIVAL ON THE SUN-SCORCHED SANDS OF THE KALAHARI DESERT IN NAMIBIA. PHOTOGRAPH BY LAURA BOMBIER.